Pinch Me, I Must Be Dreaming
by Kina Kalamari
Summary: The flock has been trapped in an illusion for the past four years. With unlikely allies, a familiar foe, and a couple bottles of Snapple, can the flock escape from their life-long prison? AU continuation from Ch. 41 of STWAOES. Summary by StephanieZorander.
1. Lies

**A/N: So, this is my new story....Okay, that was stating the glaringly obvious facts, wasn't it? Anyway, welcome to my latest excursion into the land of Maximum Ride fanfiction. I hope you all enjoy the ride. **

**In case you don't know where chapter forty-one is in STWAOES, or for whatever reason didn't read the summary, this story starts when they've been recaptured by the School and Jeb and Anne have just told them that they had never actually escaped in the first place, they just believed they had, and that all the memories were fake. Just thought I'd say that so no one was too confused.  
**

**I decided to actually write this in the format of MR, even starting my chapter numbers where I'm starting the story: partway through book three. And, strangely enough, the first one happens to be forty-two. Does that make it the answer to life, the universe, and everything? Somehow, I doubt it…**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Maximum Ride…sorry, that was boring. How 'bout backwards? Ride Maximum own not do I. Or really backwards? .ediR mumixaM nwo ton od I…heh heh.**

* * *

**42**

They had to be lying. Didn't they? I mean, there wasn't really any way we could have been at the School for four years while thinking we were free. Was there?

My brain wouldn't work. Suddenly nothing made sense. I just couldn't wrap my mind around the concept that Jeb was trying to tell me. The fact that I really didn't want to believe it may have made it just that much harder to comprehend, but hard to comprehend it was. What was real? What wasn't? Was the School even real? Was I?

_Okay, you know what, brain? I'm cutting you off there before you get into any 'meaning of life' or 'why are we here' areas. Those are strictly off-limits in an attempt to keep you sane._

Obviously it wasn't working, though. Seriously, I was talking to my own mind. That doesn't really sound sane, does it?

And all of this sidetracking in my thoughts is really just an excuse to escape what they're trying to tell me. I bet I've looked rather ridiculous for the past minute or so, just staring off into space. Probably time for me to return to Earth now.

"Max?" It was Fang. He looked rather concerned, and I wondered briefly how many times he'd said my name. When I focused on him, his concerned look lessened a little. I gave him a 'I'm here, don't worry' look, then turned back to Jeb.

"I don't believe you." Yep, that's what I said. Blunt, to the point, and rather childish, but hey, it worked.

Jeb's face took on a look I knew all too well: his 'Max, you still don't get it'/'Max, sweetie, we're only here to help' look. Well, I wasn't buying it. He had only ever betrayed me, and that most certainly did _not_ get him in my good books. Except, had he ever really betrayed us? If he'd never helped us escape, he'd never been on our side to begin with.

Oh, God, I was so confused. I really just wanted to lay down and take a nice, two-day-long nap. I figured that wasn't happening any time soon, though.

"Max," Jeb said. "What reason do you have to not believe us? Your scars are gone, your hand still works, Total is gone…Do you need any more proof?"

"How can you prove to me that my memories aren't real?" I asked heatedly. "They seem real enough to me, thank you very much!"

Jeb's expression became ever-so-slightly exasperated. "Of course they do, Maximum. They're supposed to be. We wanted you to believe that you really were living freely in the real world. It was a test to see how you dealt with things outside of here."

Another test. Of course. I guess I should've seen that one coming. That's the way it always was with Jeb. Everything was a test.

"So, did we pass?" I asked sarcastically. "Or did we fail at life?"

Jeb frowned. "We weren't testing you to see if you could live, Maximum. We were testing you to see if you could live free of restrictions. And you failed."

Hang on…we failed? How did we fail? I'd thought we'd stayed pretty low profile. None of us had died, we hadn't killed mass numbers of people with any acts of supreme stupidity…what had we done wrong?

Jeb must have seen the questions on my face, because he continued, elaborating on his original statement. "Your test was of leadership, Maximum. The hardest test of any of them. We wanted to see if you could lead the…what was it you called it? Ah, yes, the flock…To see if you could lead the flock effectively. It seems as though you couldn't. You exposed yourselves multiple times, you nearly got Fang killed, and you left the more defenseless members in a canyon while you left with the most powerful fighter to go on a wild goose chase for a home. And I'm afraid that's only the beginning of the epic failure that is Maximum Ride."

I stared at Jeb. And stared at him. And stared at him. Finally, I got my voice back. "So…I did fail at life then." Yeah, I know, it was a lame comeback, but my mind was whirling and my emotions were in turmoil, so my sharp tongue was being put on the back burner.

I looked around the room, hoping that maybe I would find answers on the faces of my flock. I didn't. Iggy's head was down, Nudge looked hopeless, Gazzy looked scared, and Fang just stared back at me, his eyes flat. I don't know what emotions he was covering up–fear, hope, or even disappointment–but no reassuring silent messages came from him. And Angel…wait, where was Angel? She and I had a plan. She was supposed to play traitor and then help us get out. And she'd been here just a moment ago, doing just that. Now she was gone.

"Where's Angel?" I asked Jeb, my voice louder than I'd originally intended. "What have you done with her?"

"Calm down, Maximum," Jeb said, disdain in his voice. I guess he no longer felt the need to play the caring father figure. "She's perfectly safe. We're just…bringing her back to her senses."

Huh? I didn't get it. "You're doing what?"

"We're erasing her false memories," Jeb told me. "We're bringing her back to the real world."

* * *

**43**

Angel was confused. She didn't know what was going on, and she wasn't completely sure she wanted to.

A minute ago, she'd been in the room with the flock, playing the perfect part of traitor. Then two Whitecoats had grabbed her and dragged her out of the room, making sure she didn't make any noise. Now the two Whitecoats had her by the arms and were hauling her down a hallway that led to who-knew-what.

Finally, she quenched her fear of the answer enough to ask, "Where are you taking me?"

But the only answer she got was, "The Restoration Room", which, while it didn't sound particularly horrible, didn't really help her understand anything.

After a couple minutes of walking, the Whitecoats stopped at a door. One of them flung the door open, and the other one shoved her inside and shut the door behind her. She heard a metallic 'snick' as the door automatically locked. She was trapped.

"Hello, Angel."

Angel whirled around at the voice…and stopped short, staring at the thing occupying the center of the room.

It was a large machine. It had a large chamber in the middle of it, which had a clear plastic door. There was a computer attached to the side of it. The most startling thing, though, was all the steam coming out of it. Any seams in the metal were leaking thick, green steam.

A Whitecoat, who Angel assumed was the owner of the voice she had heard, stepped out from behind the huge machine and smiled at her.

"Who are you?" Angel asked, instinctively trying to clutch Celeste to her before she remembered that she no longer had the bear. In fact, she hadn't had Celeste since they'd shown up at the School. How weird…

"I'm a friend," the woman said. "I'm just here to give you a little help."

That was typical, Angel thought. The Whitecoats always said they were going to help you. They never did.

"What kind of help, exactly?" she asked, hoping she sounded tough and sarcastic like Max always did.

"Well, you see," the woman said, squatting down so that she was on eye level with Angel. "Your memory has a few…problems. We're just going to correct those so that you're all better again."

Angel frowned. "I don't wanna be all better. I wanna be me."

The Whitecoat smiled gently. "Angel, darling, don't you want your mind to be right again?"

"No," Angel replied stubbornly. "There's nothing wrong with it."

The Whitecoat suddenly looked like she was forcing her smile. Angel decided to see what she was thinking.

_They expect me to deal with this impertinent kid? Why did I get stuck with this job?_

Angel liked that. She was annoying the Whitecoat, which couldn't possibly be bad.

Suddenly the Whitecoat's smile dropped away. "Okay, kid, look. It's not up to you. We're going to do this whether you want us to or not, so why not just cooperate and make it easier, huh?"

Angel's smugness evaporated. Now the Whitecoat was getting mean. After all, that's what Whitecoats did: They got mean.

"No," Angel replied defensively, trying not to let her voice waver. "I'm never gonna give in. Never gonna give up. Do what you want."

"Of course," Angel thought she heard the Whitecoat mutter. "I get a feisty, stubborn one." Then she raised her voice to a normal level. "Look, honey, I respect your, uh…pig-headedness, but fighting won't help you."

"I don't care."

The Whitecoat shrugged. "Whatever." She pulled a little gadget out of her coat. "Say goodnight, sweetheart." She touched the gadget to Angel's neck.

The last thing Angel saw was the green steam of the machine obscuring the ceiling as she slumped sideways into darkness.

* * *

**A/N: And there is chapter one of my brand new fanfic. Hope you liked it! Reviews are, as always, very much appreciated.  
**


	2. Regression

**A/N: So this story managed to catch a couple people who apparently don't read AU's, so I'm pretty happy. In honor of that, and the fact that I did in fact _get_ reviews, here's chapter two.  
**

* * *

**44**

After the Whitecoats left, I looked around at my flock. We were in bad shape. This new revelation had hit us all hard. I decided they needed some good news.

"Angel wasn't really a traitor," I said. My voice sounded weird, breaking the perfect silence like that. Unnaturally loud. "Just so you all know."

…

I guess they weren't impressed. Even Gazzy, who normally would have been thrilled at finding out that his sister wasn't really a horrible, lying witch, just grunted. Morale boosting was _not_ going to be easy.

"Come on guys, it's not that bad," I tried. "Even if all that didn't happen, as long as we remember it happening, what's the difference?"

Finally, Iggy looked up. "What's the difference? Well, Maximum Ride, the difference is that this means we have _never escaped the School before. _We no longer even know if it's possible. We could be stuck here for the rest of our lives. That reality check enough for you?"

Obviously, I hadn't thought about that. Now that it'd been brought to light, though, I suddenly felt very, very hopeless.

"Yeah," I replied quietly, my shoulders slumping. "I guess it is."

Iggy didn't make any sign of being happy that he was right. Why would he? If he'd been wrong it'd be way better for us.

"What do you think this means about Dr. Martinez?" Fang asked. "Do you think she's real, or did they make her up for this…fake life of ours?"

I shrugged. I didn't know, and I didn't want to think about it. I was going to assume that they her and Ella didn't exist, because that's the way my life usually worked out, and leave it at that.

Silence fell.

Some ten minutes later, Fang came over to me and tapped my shoulder. I looked up and met his gaze. He wanted to talk to me where the others couldn't hear. I nodded, and we moved far enough away that even with their raptor hearing they wouldn't overhear us. None of them so much as glanced up.

"Yeah?" I asked.

"This won't work," Fang said. "We all need some hope, or we're never even going to have a chance of getting out of here."

"Not that we have a chance either way."

He glared at me. "That's definitely not going to help."

"I know, I'm sorry." I rubbed my temples. "I just…I don't know how to give them hope. I don't even have any myself."

"You can do it." He sounded surprisingly certain. "You're Maximum Ride. You're the leader. You've gotten us out of way worse stuff."

"No, I haven't," I retorted. "We had a collective daydream where everyone _thought_ I did."

Fang waved his hand dismissively. "So? You were right when you said that it didn't matter. We _have_ lived that, one way or another. It still counts."

"Okay, buster," I said, just the slightest bit annoyed. "You seem to have enough reassurance for all si-" I stopped myself. "Five of us. Why don't you give the big morale speech?"

"You know why," he said. "You're the leader. If I do it, it'll seem like you've given up, and then they'll give up too."

I sighed. "Sometimes I really hate being the leader."

"You can do it," Fang repeated sincerely, holding my gaze. "I believe you can."

Staring into his dark eyes, I was suddenly jolted back to that night in the cave, just the two of us. But then, that hadn't really happened, had it? Well, Fang seemed to think that our memories were just as real as real life, whatever that was. I wondered if he thought it was real enough…

"Definitely," Fang said softly. I realized, to my horror, that I had actually asked him, and he had somehow known exactly what I was talking about.

My cheeks flushed in embarrassment. "I, um…I didn't mean to say that…"

He half-smiled. "I know you didn't."

"But you answered me anyway."

"Yeah."

"Oh." I paused awkwardly. "I should go boost some morale."

His eyes glittered in amusement. "Probably…" I could feel more coming, and sure enough, he added, "But you still don't know what you're going to say."

"Oh," I said again. "Right." I had briefly forgotten where we were, but now I was all too aware. "I'll figure it out."

"I'm sure you will," Fang agreed.

* * *

**45**

When Angel woke up, she was immediately assailed with a feeling of despair. Like she'd lost something precious. She wasn't really sure what, though…

The feeling slowly slipped away, and with it went the nagging voice in the back of her head saying she'd forgotten something. She sat up, and found herself in a small cell. She was surrounded by gray concrete on all six sides, though the side directly in front of her had a small silver door in it. She was sitting on a small, lumpy cot, which she assumed she'd been sleeping on. She couldn't really remember, though.

Actually, she couldn't remember much of anything. She knew her name was Angel, and she remembered the flock: Max, Fang, Iggy, Nudge, and Gazzy. But she didn't remember how she'd gotten where she was. In fact, the last thing she remembered was being strapped down on a bed and being hooked up to a large machine.

She felt like a lot of time had passed since then, and she had fuzzy images of a house and a black dog washing around in her mind. And a few of what she knew was the School.

She stood up. She felt…tall. That was weird…

Then she realized that the last clear memory she had, she'd been at least two feet shorter. Possibly more. What was going on?

Just then, the door slid open. A Whitecoat stepped inside, and the door closed again.

"Hello, Angel," he said kindly. "How are you feeling?"

"Don't know," she replied. "How you feel?"

The man frowned. "Angel? Why are you talking like that?"

"Talk like what?" she asked. She paused. "I in twouble?"

"I…oh dear," the man said. "Side effects…should have known…should have predicted." He looked at her. "Angel, stay here."

"I no go nowhere," she replied. "I stay here." She sat down to prove her point.

Nodding distractedly, the Whitecoat left.

"That man weird."

* * *

**46**

"Ma'am, we seem to have encountered an issue."

The Director spun around in her swivel chair. "An issue? What kind of an issue?"

Professor Henry took a deep breath. "Removing Angel's memories of her last four years of life appears to have returned her to her toddler mentality and speech patterns. I fear that this could have grave consequences on the rest of her life."

"Then fix it," the Director said dismissively. "Or don't. They're _experiments_, Professor. We _experiment_ on them. I don't care what impact it's going to have on her _life_."

"Ah, right." The Professor removed his glasses and hastily cleaned them. Placing them back on his nose, he said, "Should I return her to her flock until we decide how to repair this issue?"

The Director nodded. "Hopefully that will send a message to the rest of the brats. Show them exactly what we're going to do to them."

* * *

**47**

When the door opened and they tossed Angel in, I was momentarily ecstatic. She was safe! And she looked completely unharmed.

Then she started talking.

"You guys big too!" she said happily. "I big now. Big wings." She proudly unfurled her white wings. "I fly now, maybe. I no fly before."

I looked at Fang in horror. What had they done to our little Angel?

"Angel?" Gazzy asked tentatively, stepping forward. "You okay?"

Angel nodded emphatically. "You here. I good!"

Gazzy looked up at me. "Why's she talking like that, Max?"

I shrugged helplessly. "I don't know, Gaz." I went up to Angel and squatted down to look her eye-to-eye. "Angel, what did they do to you?"

She cocked her head, her expression confused. "They no do nothing to me. They bring me here. That it."

I had to check. "Angel, do you remember Total?"

"Total?" Angel asked. "Total what?"

I looked up at the flock. "They wiped her. She doesn't remember any of the last four years. That's why she's talking like that."

There was a long, collective silence. We were all taking in what had happened. This was way worse than I'd expected, and it could happen to any of us. Whenever the Whitecoats decided. Granted, none of us, save Gazzy, would revert to toddlerhood, but it would still be bad. I couldn't imagine being a ten-year-old brain in my fourteen-year-old body. That was just…wrong.

So, summary of our situation:

We had four years of false life

The Whitecoats wanted to remove our memories of said four years

We'd never previously escaped, and therefore didn't know if we even could

Angel had already lost her memories

Gee, looks promising, doesn't it? Yeah…not really.

But after all, I was Maximum Ride, and even if the memories I had were not completely real, they gave me the hope I needed. I would escape from here, and nothing would stop me…or my flock, of course.

Unless they got us first.

We'd just have to make sure that didn't happen.

* * *

**A/N:** **Well, you know what to do, I think. Hm...short AN's today...**


	3. Resistance

**A/N: So, um...I'd like to say "I'm sorry" to IndifferentIgnorance, as I seem to have accidentally lied to you. There is actually a little bit of action in this chapter. Not much, but technically still there. **

**And to everyone else, happy reading!  
**

* * *

**48**

"They're gonna take away our memories?" Nudge asked, looking freaked. "Everything we've lived outside? Our house? New York? Florida? Total?"

Iggy nodded, looking numb. "Guess so."

Gazzy slumped against the wall, hopelessness etched all over his face. "Our life sucks."

"Guys!" I reprimanded. "Don't do this! _We're stronger than this._ We're not going to let them take us. Right?"

But even Fang was silent, staring off into space. Probably thinking deep thoughts about how we were all going to be trapped here for the rest of our lives.

"Come on!" I pleaded. "Please, I need you with me on this!"

No one spoke, though Fang's eyes did come back into focus and look at me. I gave him a desperate look. He shrugged and pushed himself off the wall to stand upright.

"Max is right, guys," he said. "We can't let them beat us. That's letting them win, right?"

Iggy shrugged noncommittally. "Like it even matters. Winning, losing…who cares?"

"I care!" I shouted at him. "I care that they're always telling us what to do! I care that they think they can control us! _We won't give in!"_ I stopped, breathing a little harder. I took a deep breath, trying to calm myself down. "They _don't_ control us. We are who we are, and they can't tell us different. And who I am is someone who doesn't give up. Someone who will fight to get out of here, no matter what. I thought you guys were too, but it seems I was wrong." I looked at each of them in turn, daring them to argue with me.

Everyone was silent for a moment, then Gazzy said, "I'll fight, Max."

I smiled at him. "That's my little trooper. We'll fight the good fight, yeah?"

He grinned. "Yeah."

I looked around at the others. "Anyone else?"

Nudge sighed, then said, "Yeah. I'm in."

"Great," I said. _Only one left…_And we all turned to look at Iggy. Somehow I think he sensed it, because he raised his head.

"I know you're all staring at me," he said quietly, "and I'll help. I really will. But that doesn't mean I think we've even got a shot at getting out of here."

"Don't be like that, Ig," I pleaded. "You're stronger than that, I know you are. Just wait and see. We'll get out of here."

"Fine," he said. "Go ahead and surprise me."

As it turned out, we never got the chance to.

* * *

**49**

"Ma'am, I really don't feel that we should attempt a memory wipe on any of the other experiments," Professor Henry said, knowing that defying the Director was never good. Still, what she wanted to do went against all of his scientific morals, knowledge, and even his gut instincts. "Please, just let us try to find another way. Or at least fix the current method."

The Director sighed and stood up from the chair behind her desk. "How many times do I have to tell that I _don't care_ what happens to these experiments? Are you telling me that you _do_ care?"

Professor Henry backtracked quickly. "N-no, ma'am. I just…well, it's just…" He licked his lips nervously and started over. "W-wouldn't it be b-better to leave them in as g-g-good a condition as p-possible? After all, d-damaged experiments aren't n-nearly as u-useful…" He trailed off, shrinking under the disdainful look the Director was giving him.

"Exactly when did you develop a stutter, Professor?" she asked coldly. "I wasn't aware you had any _speech impediments_."

"I d-don't, ma'am," the professor replied meekly, cursing the stutter in his answer. He only stuttered when he was lying or evasive, but he didn't think the Director knew that…at least he hoped she didn't.

"Hm…" She studied him for a moment, then walked around the desk to stand in front of him. "So you want to find another means of controlling the winged experiments?"

"Yes, ma'am," he said, relieved. "Perhaps we could simply sedate them? Or maybe we could freeze them. Our cryogenics are the best in the country, after al-"

"No," the Director snapped. "They will stay awake and aware throughout anything other than internal surgery. I want them to know our power."

"Oh," the professor said, losing his steam. "Of course, ma'am." Personally, Professor Henry thought that all of this power nonsense was complete balderdash. He was just there for the chance to practice advanced sciences. Sometimes he even thought he was in over his head, but it wasn't like he could back out now. He'd be dead within hours. "So what would you suggest?"

The Director stroked her chin thoughtfully. "Hm…Send in whoever it was that did the work for the experiments' fake lives. The mental expert or whatever he is."

Professor Henry nodded and used his cell phone to call down to the lab. Six and a half minutes later, Doctor Jones stepped into the office.

The Director frowned at him. "You're a minute and a half late. I told you five minutes." Not giving him a chance to reply, the Director turned back to Professor Henry. "You're dismissed. I'll call when I need to speak with you again."

Professor Henry nodded and left the office. On his way out, he heard the Director ask Doctor Jones, "So what was it you did to them to make them believe they were actually living a different life?"

"W-w-w-well, m-m-m-ma'am," was the response, "we s-s-s-simply a-a-altered their p-p-p-p-p-p-perceptions a b-b-b-b-bit…"

Professor Henry smiled slightly. Now there was a man with a _real_ speech impediment.

* * *

**50**

I was about to start outlining an escape plan when the door to our room/cell opened, and at least ten security guards entered, followed by three Whitecoats. I was immediately on high alert; this couldn't be good.

"Okay," one of the Whitecoats said, "we can either do this the easy way, where you just come with us, or we can do it the hard way, where you get knocked out with tasers. What's it going to be?"

Wow. A Whitecoat who actually seemed to know how to deal with us…Weird. No cookies this time. Just the cold hard facts. It made me almost like the guy.

Almost.

"Oh, I dunno," I said sarcastically. I turned to my flock. "Do we give in to the evil maniacs or fight for our sweet freedom?" _If Iggy pipes up with a "Give in", I'll shoot him with the taser myself…_

But he didn't, and Nudge, Gazzy, and Fang had already adopted hard, determined expressions.

"Huh." I turned back to the Whitecoat. "Sorry, but it looks like they say fight."

The Whitecoat just looked at me with that detached, unpleasant expression your average evil villain generally wears. "I'm sorry to hear that." She turned away and waved her hand at us, signaling the guards. "Do whatever you have to. Just get them moving."

And…fight.

We did. Quite well, I think. We would've been more than a match for those morons had they not been carrying those electric tasers. Admittedly, I'd thought we had a chance. But we didn't really. I figured that out about the same time I watched Nudge get shocked so bad that her eyes rolled back and she fell unconscious. One of the guards picked her up off the floor (that's right, he didn't even deign to catch her…jerk), slung her over his shoulder, and carried her out the door. Next was Gazzy, then Iggy.

Fang didn't go under with the first shock. He fell to his knees, but then he got up and kept punching. The guards didn't like that. They took their revenge by shocking him at least five times. He shuddered and fell, and they dragged him out while I screamed his name like a bloody fool. Then the seven remaining guards converged on me, and when the shock came, I just went limp and let them take me away. I didn't want to get knocked out. I had to know what they were doing to us.

They brought me to a very white room full of odd machines and strapped me to a table. The last thing I remembered was a strange metal cap coming down over my head, and then I was out.

* * *

**A/N: I haven't been getting a huge amount of reviews for this story, but I'm assuming that's 'cause there aren't that many people reading it. So if you're reading it but not reviewing, could at least review once to let me know that I do have readers? Thanks, that'd be great. =)  
**


	4. Awakening

**A/N: Okaaayyyy...How is everyone? Hopefully melting less than I am. I live in New England, and temperatures here recently sky-rocketed to ninety degrees. Gah. It's cooled down a little, though. Yesterday was awful, but today was better. Anyway, you guys probably don't want to listen to me rant about my lack of air conditioning, so I'll get on to the story now.  
**

* * *

**51**

"Hey, I think she's waking up."

A girl's voice…but whose? It sounded vaguely familiar. My eyelids fluttered as I tried to shake away my fogginess.

"Okay, you two, let's give her some space."

Another voice. This one was female, like the first one, but older…and suddenly I knew whose it was…Dr. Martinez's. But what was she doing at the School?

I opened my eyes, determined to find out what was going on, and saw…Fang?

"Oh, thank God!" I exclaimed. "You're okay!" And then I did something I insanely regretted almost immediately afterward…I threw my arms around his neck and hugged him.

"Uh…" He did the usual rock formation impersonation. "Yeah, I'm fine." He leaned back and pulled me off. "Are _you_ okay?"

I realized what I'd just done and turned a furious shade of red. Turning slowly on the spot, I saw Dr. Martinez and Ella watching me. Ella was grinning, and even Dr. Martinez had a small smile on her face. Crap.

"Er…hi," I said. "What's going on? How'd you get here?"

Dr. M's smile vanished, and a worried frown appeared between her eyebrows.

"Are you sure you didn't mess with her brain as well as her arm?" Fang asked from behind me, and I couldn't tell whether or not he was serious.

"I really don't think so," Dr. M replied. "Maybe she had an unusual reaction to the Valium? It's never been tested on avian hybrids, after all."

Valium?

And then it hit me. Valium was that stuff that Dr. Martinez had given me when she'd operated on my arm. It'd made me loopy and say stuff I insanely regretted. And Fang had talked about messing with my arm…What the hell was going on? Why was I suddenly back here?

"Max," Fang said slowly, coming around in front of me. "What are you talking about?"

Just to verify things, I said, "So, you just took the chip out of my arm?"

Dr. M nodded. "Yes, Max. I had to knock you out because you started struggling too much during the operation, and you've just woken up."

I shook my head a little. "Weird."

"What's weird?" Fang asked.

I looked at him. "You don't remember being at the School again?" His eyebrows went up, and I knew he had no clue what I was talking about. Still, I kept going. "The flock got captured in the canyon where we left them and we followed them, and the School got us all. Then they told us that we'd never left in the first place and we had always been there, they'd just made us believe we'd escaped and actually lived." His expression remained completely nonplussed. "You seriously don't know what I'm talking about?"

"Max," Dr. M said. "I think the most likely possibility here is that the Valium reacted oddly with your brain, and it caused you to have a very vivid, very real dream."

"I…but…" I stared around at them. I was so confused. First our life was a dream, and now them telling us that our life was a dream was a dream? I groaned and sank back down onto the couch where I'd woken up, my face in my hands.

"Hey." I peered through my fingers to see Fang crouching in front of me. "Just forget about it, okay? We're not at the School, we're free. Don't let a dream ruin your day."

I sighed. "If it _was_ a dream. It seemed so real…" I trailed off at the look on Fang's face. "Right. Forgetting about it."

He grinned. "Good girl."

"Still," I said, "can we go back to the flock and make sure they're okay?"

"We probably _should_ get back," he agreed. "Even if they're perfectly safe."

Ella pouted. "But you guys just got here."

My sense of time must still have been screwed up from my strange dream, because I was having trouble making my internal clock match up with what Ella had just said. How long had we been there, again?

"What would you two think about coming to live with us?"

The question was so random, it took me a minute to comprehend it, but when I did, I was rather shocked. I looked up at Dr. M in amazement.

"I mean, you don't have to," she added hastily. "Just an idea. And you could bring your, uh…your flock, too."

"I…wow." I stared at her for a minute, then, coming back down to reality, shook my head. "We couldn't. I'm sure you don't have room, and we eat a _lot_ of food, and, most importantly, I'm fairly certain we're still being chased by Itex."

"Oh, we have plenty of room," Dr. M said, smiling. "I don't think the food would be too big of a deal either. And as for the danger part of it–"

"It's not even a problem."

I looked at Fang in surprise. I certainly hadn't expected him to support this. "What do you mean?"

He shrugged. "Well, we were looking for a home anyway, and the Erasers seem to have vanished…I don't think we've really got anything to worry about."

"Oh." I didn't know what to say. So I said the first thing that came to mind. "Okay, then."

* * *

**52**

Fang and I flew quickly back toward the canyon where we'd left the flock. Our parting with the Martinez's had been easy knowing that we were coming right back. I still couldn't really believe they were doing this for us. I mean, we barely knew them. Heck, the rest of the flock had never even met them.

Fang glanced over at me. "What're you thinking about?"

"Just thinking how amazing this is," I replied. "Totally unexpected, but way awesome, you know?"

He nodded, smiling ever-so-slightly. "Yeah. I'm right there with you."

A thought struck me, and I decided to voice it, however unpleasant it may be.

"Um, Fang?" I asked tentatively. "Did I…say anything? While I was on the Valium?"

Fang frowned. "No. You were unconscious. Why?"

I just shook my head. "No reason."

So I'd dreamed about that incredibly embarrassing situation. Huh. Why would my subconscious put _that_ in my dream? Then again, why would my subconscious put any of that dream in my dream? Maybe it was a desperate plea to be recognized by my subconscious fears of having my life be a lie. But then, that would mean that the Embarrassing Incident must be a subconscious…

No. I wasn't going there. That path led to bad, bad places, I'm sure.

* * *

**53**

When we got to the canyon, we found the rest of the flock safe and completely unharmed. Thank God my dream hadn't been some kind of freaky premonition.

I skidded into the camp with my usual bravado, spraying dust everywhere. Fang touched down gently behind me, shaking his head. I knew he was shaking his head at me, but decided to ignore it.

"Hey, guys," I said cheerfully. "What's up?"

Iggy shrugged. "Not a lot. Did you guys find us a home, then?"

I nodded, grinning. "We sure did. Nudge, do you remember when you, Fang, and I were flying cross-country to Death Valley to save Angel? I stopped and went to save a girl from some bullies?" Nudge nodded, and I continued. "Well, her and her mom took care of me when I got shot then, and Fang and I have just been to see them again. Dr. Martinez took the chip out of my arm, and then she offered to let us live with them, and I said yes."

My speech was met with an excited yell from Gazzy, high-pitched squeals from Angel and Nudge, and a huge grin from Iggy.

"Wow, Max!" Nudge exclaimed. "This is amazing! I can't believe it…We have a home! Is it a nice house? What color is it? Do they have a pool? What about a pool table?"

"Whoa, Nudge, slow down," I said, laughing. "It's a very nice house, it's blue, and there's a pool but no pool table."

"Oh my God!" Nudge squealed. She turned to Angel, grinning. "They have a _pool_!"

I smiled. It was so good to see them so happy. I looked at Fang, and he grinned his special grin at me, making my world spin a little.

"Okay, flock!" I called over the noise of the celebration. "Let's go home!"

You would not believe how amazing it felt to actually say that.

"Pinch me," I told Fang. "I _must_ be dreaming." Still grinning, he complied. Rubbing the spot, I complained, "Ow."

He smirked, and took off into the air after the rest of the flock. I followed, grinning my fool head off.

* * *

**A/N: So, er...reviews?  
**


	5. Surprise

**A/N: Thank you guys for the reviews. Other than the one person who seemed to think the story was over after the last chapter (I'm still scratching my head over that one), you've all been pretty enthusiastic about this fic, which makes me happy. Hopefully this chapter will help you get more of a feel for what's going on, too.  
**

* * *

**54**

When Fang woke up, his first thought was that his head should hurt, but didn't. He remembered a stupid thug of a security guard whacking him over the head with something when he'd briefly woken up as they dragged him through the halls of the School. But his head felt fine. Weird.

Opening his eyes, he had his second thought as he processed what his eyes were telling him…_Since when does the School have a cave?_ Because, yes, he was in a cave. He was lying on the floor of a cave, actually. And now that he really thought about it, it looked an awful lot like the one he and Max had camped out in that horrible night when she had run out on him. Almost identical, in fact. Again, weird.

And then, turning his head, he got his third thought: _Holy crap._ Because Max was sleeping next to him, a peaceful smile on her face, and she was _laying on his arm_. Like maybe he'd fallen asleep with his arms around her. But that couldn't be right. It just couldn't. Something very odd was going on here…

He was about to sit up, when he realized that doing so would probably wake Max up. Unfortunately, just his brief movement of thinking about sitting up was enough to wake her up. Well, at least she might be able to give him some answers.

She blinked sleepily and yawned, then opened her eyes fully and stared straight at him. He tensed, expecting her to get a hugely startled expression on her face and jump up, demanding to know what had happened.

She didn't.

Instead, she just smiled at him. "Hey."

"Um…" was all he managed.

Max didn't seem to make anything of his inability to speak properly. She sat up, and Fang followed suit, albeit a little warily.

"So, uh–" he began, but he didn't get to finish, because Max turned and kissed him.

… … …Wow. To say he was shocked would have been the largest understatement since Nudge had called David Bowie "a little odd".

After a moment, Max pulled away and frowned at him. "What's wrong?"

"I, uh…" His thoughts no longer seemed to be progressing in a normal order, and he was finding it hard to string a coherent sentence together. Finally he managed, somewhat weakly, "What was that?"

Max's expression became a mixture of hurt, uncertainty, and what looked almost like fear. "Oh, I…I didn't mean…Sorry." She turned away and drew her knees up to her chest.

Fang wanted to shout, "What the _hell_ is going on here?", but he refrained himself, because he didn't really think it would help at this point. Instead, he put a hand on Max's arm, and said quietly, "What's going on?"

Max shrugged, not looking at him. "Nothing, I guess. I thought that last night meant…" She trailed off, and Fang heard a sniffle. "Never mind."

Last night? _Last night?_ He wasn't liking what all the evidence was pointing to, and he felt a very strong need to find out just what had happened. So he asked.

"What exactly happened last night?"

Now she looked at him, and her eyes held incredulity. "What do mean, 'what happened'? Are you brain damaged or something now?"

"Er…no," he replied, scratching the back of his neck. "I just, uh…I don't remember last night. I don't even know how I got here, honestly."

Her eyebrows shot up. "Last night was the best freaking night of my life, and _you don't remember it_? Does the world hate me or something?"

Best night of her life? Oh, no… "Max, could you _please_ tell me what happened last night?"

She blushed. "Um…you kissed me. And then I kissed you. And then we fell asleep…" She trailed off. "Do I have to go into the details?"

Fang nearly sighed with relief. So nothing…extreme had happened. But then the relief was gone, and confusion set in again. "Maybe a little. What happened before I kissed you?"

She shrugged. "We ate some roasted rabbit and you told me I could change my mind about having to save the world."

Hang on…what? But she was describing that night in the cave, when she'd run out on him. Except apparently she hadn't run out on him. Or something.

"Believe it or not," he said slowly, "I actually know that. But after the bit about telling you to change your mind, I think things are a tad muddled. So, you _stayed_ when I kissed you?"

"Um…yes?"

"Okay, weird." He dropped his head into his hands. "This doesn't make any sense!"

Then suddenly she was crouching in front of him, gently taking his hands off his face and forcing him to look at her. "Does it have to? I mean, I'm curious to know why your memory's messed up too, but…um…" She trailed off, turning a rather impressive shade of red. "To hell with it," she muttered, and leaned forward to kiss him.

This time Fang didn't freeze up in shock. This time he let the feeling of actually having Max respond to him wash through him, and kissed her back. This was _so_ much better than that weird, wonky dream he'd had.

* * *

**55**

"So, the flock's in that canyon, right?" Fang asked, leaning against the cave wall and playing absent-mindedly with Max's fingers. "Perfectly safe?"

"Mm-hmm," she replied, somewhat drowsily. Her head was resting on his shoulder, and her eyes were half closed. "Perfectly safe."

"And we're supposed to be finding us all a home."

"Yuh-huh."

He grinned. "How 'bout that island idea?"

"Sounds wonderful," she said, smiling vaguely. "Lead the way, oh captain, my captain."

Oh, yeah. This was the life.

_Someone pinch me,_ Fang thought. _I must be dreaming._

* * *

**56**

"Oh, James! What have you done?"

_James?_ Iggy thought blearily. _Who's James?_

He sat up slowly, blinking away grogginess. He listened intently, trying to figure out who else was in the room with him. He heard a movement directly in front of him, and then someone walking toward him.

"James, dear," said the same voice again, motherly and affectionate. "You really mustn't play with chemicals like that anymore. They could be dangerous."

Iggy processed this. So _he_ was James? What was going on?

Then he remembered something; when he had found his parents in D.C., they'd called him James. And now that he thought about it, the woman's voice really did sound like his mom's. But why was he back there?

"Um…what's going on?" he asked, running his hands over his face. "What am I doing here?"

"Oh, no," she breathed. "Did the explosion give you amnesia? James, dear, what's your name?"

Under any other circumstances, Iggy would have laughed out loud at the pure ridiculousness of that sentence. For this situation, though, he had a different answer.

"It's Iggy," he replied sharply. "Tell me what's going on." He felt no need to be nice to her. The last time he'd been here, she and his dad had been trying to sell his life's story to the press.

"Oh." She sounded taken aback. "I see. Yes," she muttered to herself. "That is what they said they'd called you…" Her voice regained its usual tone, and she said resignedly, "Would you rather we called you Iggy, darling?"

"I don't care _what_ you call me!" he shouted. "Just tell me what's going on!"

"Now, James," she said sternly, "there's no need to be like that. We're all family here."

"_You're_ not my family," Iggy said through clenched teeth. "My _real_ family is stuck at the School having experiments done on them, and you're sitting here telling me there's no need to be like that? Tell. Me. What's. Going. On!"

He heard her stand up. "Nothing's going on, sweetie. You're here, and you're safe. And what do you mean, your 'real' family is being experimented on? Who are you even talking about?"

"I'm talking about Max and Fang and the rest of the flock," he replied coldly. "And I mean that they're stuck at a facility that wants to turn them inside out and find out how they work." He stood up. "I have to find them. Where are we?"

"Honey, we're in Washington D.C.," she replied, sounding almost afraid. "I don't know what's gotten into you, but this is your home now." Her next words sounded choked and tearful. "We've only known you were alive for two days. We can't lose you again."

"Yeah? Well, deal with i–" He stopped, registering what she'd said. "Hang on…two days? What do you mean, two days?"

"Two days ago, when you showed up on our doorstep with those other boys and girls," she replied, sniffling. "It was the best day of my life, and I know your father feels the same way."

Okay, that was weird. She was talking about when Max and Fang had found his parents, and then brought him to meet them. She must be. So then…No, this didn't make sense. What had happened to months after they'd left Virginia? Florida, and Itex, and Max II? Had he just…dreamed them? He couldn't see why he would've. If he was going to dream about a life, why wouldn't his subconscious make it really nice? Instead, they'd been on the run, chased by Erasers and Flyboys. WTH?

But if none of that was real, he realized, that would mean that his parents never actually sold him out to the media.

Wow.

He sat back down on the bed and ran a hand through his hair. He vaguely noticed that it felt clean, as opposed to greasy and caked with dust (and occasionally blood). Neat.

"Are you okay, dear?"

"Um…yeah," he replied vaguely. "I mean, no. I…I don't know." Did having extreme dream hallucinations count as being okay?

"Well, a good meal should fix that," she said, sounding just like a mother. He guessed that made sense, what with her _being_ a mother and all. "Come downstairs. I've made waffles for brunch, and your father's got some exciting news for you."

Iggy stood up and followed her out of the room, which he had concluded must be his bedroom. He smelled the waffles before they reached the kitchen, and he had to admit, they smelled wonderful.

"James!" came his father's voice. "You won't believe what I have to tell you!"

Iggy wasn't so sure about that. He'd seen…er, _heard_ _of_ some pretty strange things in his life. It was hard to surprise him. "Alright. Fire away."

"Right," his dad began, "I'm an ophthalmologist."

Iggy was sure that his face was a big question mark. He had no idea what that meant.

His dad must have noticed, because he continued, "An eye doctor. I work with eye diseases and eyesight correction." Iggy suddenly saw where this might be going. "My team has been involved in some groundbreaking new discoveries, and one of them is the reparation of blindness."

He'd been right. He wouldn't get his hopes up, he wouldn't get his hopes up…

"Well?" he father prompted. "Say something. Wouldn't you like to be able to see again?"

"That would be amazing," Iggy managed to say, rather hoarsely.

"Excellent!" Iggy could hear the smile in his father's voice. "I'm completely confident in our methods, or of course I would never try it out on my own son. I think we can probably get you in within a couple of days. What do you think? Are you in?"

Iggy immediately nodded, then held out his hand to his mother. "Pinch me."

"What?" she asked, sounding rather startled. "Why?"

"I've got to be dreaming."

Laughing, she pinched the base of his thumb. It hurt.

Iggy spent the rest of the day in the best mood of his life.

* * *

**A/N: Did that clear things up for anyone? I hope so.**

**Also, has anyone reading this seen Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time yet? I've seen it twice already, and I was wondering what other people's opinions on it are. I've gotten both highly positive and very negative responses to that question, and I'm trying to figure out what the majority is. Personally, I think it was an awesome movie, but I may be in the minority there...And considering it just came out last Friday, I guess I can't hope for too many replies. Oh well. Still, if you have seen it, I'd love your thoughts. =)  
**


	6. Paradise

**A/N: I have nothing to say, except...  
**

**Disclaimer: Oh my God! I have **_**got **_**to stop stealing quotes! Usually they're not exact quotes, but since these are, I thought they should have a disclaimer. Anyway, there are a couple quotes in here from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, from the episodes "Tabula Rasa" and "Fool for Love". They belong to Joss Whedon (or whatever writers happened to write those two episodes), so if anyone recognizes them, just know that I'm not trying to pass them off as my own words. **

* * *

**57**

Wow.

That was all I could think. My life had taken an extraordinary turn in just a couple of days, and I was having trouble adjusting. We'd gone from living in caves and canyons eating rabbit-on-a-stick to living in a beautiful house, where there were beds with clean sheets and plenty of hamburgers to go around. It was amazing.

The Martinez's house was somewhat huge, so each of the flock members had gotten their own room, except Gazzy and Angel, who were sharing for now. Admittedly, they'd had to clean out the 'game room', which Ella said they almost never used, and buy a new bedroom set in order for Iggy to not have to share with Fang (no, there was no chance of Nudge sharing with me; as leader of the flock, I got certain…privileges), but it all worked out.

I think I had been worried about losing my authority as leader of the flock when we moved into the Martinez's, but it turned out that I had nothing to worry about. Dr. M was really good about not trying to be a pseudo-mom for my flock, and it was like we were living back at the E-shaped house in the Colorado mountains, just with better food and better company.

The only change I noticed was between myself and Fang. Even if I hadn't actually confessed any strange feelings under the influence of Valium, the incident in the cave was still hanging over us, and I think that not being on the run made it even harder to forget about it. We had nothing to distract us, like we had in my dream, and my dream was already fading into the background, making me feel closer to reality than I had in a long while. Most of the time I figured that was a good thing, because I appreciated what was happening to us even more, but whenever Fang sent me one of those _looks_, I suddenly wished I could disconnect myself from it all.

One day, while the rest of the flock was watching TV or something in the living room, Fang pulled me aside in the hall.

"Can we talk?"

A sinking feeling in my stomach told me exactly where this was going, so I responded as indifferently as I could. "Vocal cord-wise? Yes. With each other? No." I tried to make my way to the living room, but Fang grabbed my wrist. Heat seared my skin, and I immediately pulled my arm away and turned around to glare at him.

"Max, please," he said. "We can't keep dancing around each other like this."

"You think we're dancing?" I asked skeptically.

He shrugged. "It's all we've ever done." He paused to look me straight in the eyes. "We need to get past this, Max."

"Get past what?" I asked stubbornly. I knew I was being infuriating, but when had I ever not been? I just had trouble facing emotional stuff.

Fang seemed to agree with my thoughts, because he said, "You know exactly what." His voice was low and had a dangerous edge to it. "I'm tired of this. You just can't seem to admit that there might be something between us, and it's driving me insane. If you don't give in, then I'm giving up." He stopped there, letting the words hang between us for a moment. Then, with one last meaningful look at me, he turned and walked away, leaving me to battle with feelings that may or may not actually exist.

* * *

**58**

"So explain again exactly what it is you've done to them," the Director demanded of Doctor Jones. "I don't think I quite understand."

Professor Henry, watching from the sidelines, felt sympathy for Jones rise within him. When the Director didn't understand something, it made her angry, because it meant that she wasn't in complete control of the situation.

"They h-have b-b-b-b-b-been p-p-p-put into a sp-sp-special c-c-coma," Jones replied. "It r-r-reacts to th-th-their s-s-subconscious w-w-wishes and cr-creates an en-en-environment in which th-they w-w-will b-b-be h-h-happier than ever b-b-b-b-before."

The Director frowned. "We're making them _happy_? What kind of lame-brained experiment is this?"

Professor Henry interrupted, saving Doctor Jones the trouble of stuttering through another explanation. "I think I understand. It's a way of controlling them. If they're happy in their own paradises, they won't want to get out."

But the Director still wasn't satisfied. "I don't want them happy. That's completely against all of our ideals."

Professor Henry had really had enough of her "ideals", but he obviously didn't say that aloud. "Yes, ma'am, I believe that's understood. But really, this is a much better option. It will keep them sedated and out of our hair, and they're still aware of _something_. It meets all of your requirements."

"I don't care," the Director said. "They are _not_ supposed to be HAPPY." She shouted the last word, and both of the men in the room flinched. "This is ridiculous! Where have all of my sadistic doctors gone? They knew what was what."

"I b-b-b-believe you h-had th-them k-k-k-k-k-killed, m-m-ma'am," Doctor Jones stuttered tentatively.

"Why?" the Director asked.

"Various reasons," Professor Henry said. "Some of them weren't performing as well as you wanted, some of them betrayed you, some of them tried to back out, and some of them you just killed because you were in a bad mood."

"Oh, right," the Director said, sounding vaguely disappointed. "Well, that's beside the point. I want you to immediately begin torture on the experiments. I don't care if you wake them up or not, just make sure they're as _un_happy as possible. Dismissed."

The two men knew better than to argue with the Director. At least to her face.

* * *

**59**

"I don't like this," Professor Henry muttered as they made their way back to the lab. "This is wrong."

"I agree with you," Doctor Jones said. "I think I shall be fudging my reports from now on."

Professor Henry looked up in surprise. "What happened to your stutter?"

Doctor Jones shrugged. "I was faking it. It gets on her nerves."

"Nice," Professor Henry said, grinning. Then his smile faded. "What do you mean, you're going to fudge your reports?"

"I mean that I don't plan to begin torturing the experiments," Doctor Jones replied. "I'm simply going to tell the Director that I am."

"Ah. Excellent."

"Quite."

"We may yet make a difference, eh?"

"Indeed."

* * *

**60**

When Iggy walked into school the day after his surgery, he could hardly believe his eyes…and he was loving the fact that he could say that.

His parents had enrolled him back in the school where Max and the flock were, even though it was a bit of a commute. They understood that he wanted to keep in touch with the flock, since they had been his closest, and only, family for fourteen years.

So, on a sunny Tuesday morning, Iggy Griffiths (he had a last name!) was getting his first real look at the people he'd spent his entire life with.

"Oh my God, Iggy!" Nudge squealed as he walked up to them. "You're here!"

"Yep," he replied cheerfully, grinning at her. "My parents enrolled me here so I could see you guys more often."

As the rest of the flock grinned at each other, Fang looked at Iggy and said, "Literally, too, right Ig?"

Iggy smiled. "Nicely observed, Fang."

Gazzy looked between them, confusion clouding his face. "Huh?"

Max was the first to catch on. "Holy crap, Iggy! How'd they do it?"

"Surgery," he replied. "My new dad's an ophthalmologist, and his team has been doing groundbreaking research on eyesight correction and the reparation of blindness and wow, did I feel educated saying all that."

Max beamed at him. "That's awesome, Ig. You hit the family jackpot, didn't ya?"

And that was when the rest of the flock put two and two together. The shrieks of joy from the younger set were probably heard for miles.

* * *

**61**

"So…you're back."

Iggy looked over at the blonde who had spoken. She was standing next to him in the lunch line, looking down at the food choices. Iggy was momentarily stunned; she was extremely pretty, and something about her just sort of…drew him in. Then enough coherent thought reentered his brain to make him realize that he knew her voice.

"Tess?" he asked hesitantly.

She looked up at him, eyebrows raised. "Um…yeah. Don't tell me you didn't remember me."

He smiled at her very confidant words. "No, I did. Just getting used to having a face to go with the voice."

"What do you mean?" Then her eyes widened. "Hey! You're not blind anymore!"

"Nope," he agreed, grinning. "Definitely not."

"Wow!" She stared at him, a look of awe on her face. "How'd you do it?"

"My dad's an ophthalmologist," he replied. "He's been doing research in that area, and his team just figured out a way to repair blindness. And voila! No more blind Iggy."

Too late he realized his slip.

"Iggy?" Tess asked curiously. "I'm fairly certain you told me your name was Jeff."

"Oh, uh," Iggy stammered. "It is. And it's not–"

"Okay, what's your real name?" she interrupted. "What do your parents call you?"

"Ah, well…they call me James," Iggy replied, scratching his neck. "But seriously, you should call me Iggy. That's the one I know the best."

Tess looked very confused, and with good reason. Iggy was surprised she didn't just call him a nut job and leave right then. But she just smiled and said, "Right. Iggy it is, then."

"Yo! Dude!" someone called from further back in the line. "Quit flirting with the chick and get a move on. You're holding up the line!"

Iggy narrowed his eyes and flipped the guy off, but moved out of line anyway. No use starting a fight where there didn't need to be one.

* * *

**A/N: So, an amazing story just finished. It's called Diary of a Lovesick Mutant, and as popular as it is, most of you readers probably know about or are reading it. Still, I thought I'd advertise it here, because it just is so. Freaking. Awesome. At first glance, it's a really goofy, almost parody-like story too full of sex jokes, but with a closer look, it's the epitome of brilliant writing. Heart-string-pulling, funny-bone-tickling...This story is AMAZING. If you haven't read it, go read it as soon as you have time. I guarantee that even if you don't love it right off, you'll be laughing and crying right along with all its other fans by the end. **

**And now I'll stop advertising other peoples' stories and say...**

**Review!  
**


	7. Bliss

**A/N: After apologizing for taking so long to update, I'd like to explain something.**

**It seems as though some of you were under the mistaken impression that Fang and Max are in the same fantasy/dream thingy. They're not. I don't know if the only people who thought that were the ones I already cleared it up for, but in case they weren't, here's my explanation:**

**The cave incident that Max was talking about in the last chapter was not the one that happened in Fang's fantasy. It was the one that actually happened in the third MR book. Now, even if you didn't get that, this chapter should certainly tell you. I just thought I'd explain that bit in the last chapter so no one pesters me about it.**

* * *

**62**

"One word," Max said, "that describes how you're feeling right now. Come on, it's not that hard."

Fang smiled. "Harder than it sounds, though." She opened her mouth to protest, but he held up a hand to stop her. "Just hang on a minute. I'm thinking."

There were far too many words that worked. 'Happy' was nowhere near good enough. 'Euphoric' was too bubbly. 'Delighted' just didn't fit. 'Pleased' was worse than 'happy'. What word could possibly sum up living in your very own paradise?

Which, in Fang's case, was a tropical island, barely two miles wide. They didn't have a house, but they really didn't need one. Nudge and Angel were working on building themselves a tree fort (they insisted that it _wasn't_ a treehouse, for whatever reason), but mostly the flock was content sleeping in the vines that swung from the trees. The crystal clear pools provided drinking water, and the fish, clams, and wildlife provided plenty of food. The water was perfect for swimming in, and the beaches were beautiful. The island was just far enough away from land that they could barely see it, but close enough to fly to when they really needed something.

And of course, there was Max. She was most certainly contributing to Fang's state of bliss…Aha! Bliss.

"Blissful," Fang said. "You?"

She smirked and leaned closer. "I agree with your statement."

He raised his eyebrows, leaning back a little. "No way. Come up with your own word."

"Don't want to."

"Don't care."

Max took a step back. "Okay, fine. Be that way." Then she turned around and started walking away.

"Yo, Max!" Fang called after her. "That's blackmail!"

She grinned over her shoulder. "Don't care."

Sighing, he headed after her. After a few more strides, she stopped and let him catch up to her. Once he had, she started walking again.

"So this fits your idea of a secluded island?" Max asked. "This is what you had in mind?"

"Yeah," Fang said. "Definitely. It's perfect."

She smiled. "Awesome."

"My thoughts exactly," he agreed.

* * *

**63**

Iggy thought he was finally getting the hang of high school. It was confusing, with all the classes to get to, and having a locker combination to remember, and trying to make sure all your homework got done…but he was getting it. Tess was helping tremendously, and the rest of the flock being as inexperienced as he was helped to make the embarrassment of not knowing which room his math class was in a little smaller.

Two weeks in, though, he had finally figured out where everything was. He was quite proud of himself, until Tess informed him of the necessary memorization of the cafeteria menu.

"What do you mean, I have to memorize it?" he asked her indignantly. "What for?"

Tess shrugged. "I guess it's up to you, but if you don't know what they're making, you'll never know when to eat what they're serving, and when to stay as far away from it as possible."

"Are you saying they'll try to poison me?"

Here eyebrows shot up, probably because of his serious tone. "God, no! Sometimes it's just not particularly edible."

_Right,_ Iggy thought. _Note to self: Don't ask paranoid questions that will make people think you're a psycho._

Out loud, though, he said, "Gotcha. So on the days they serve green goop, I bring a lunch from home."

She nodded. "Bingo." Then, grinning, she added, "Unfortunately for you, this happens to be one of those days. Every other Wednesday, the cook attempts beef stroganoff, which is actually more of a _gray_ goop."

Iggy shuddered. "And I have no lunch."

Tess smiled. "Don't worry. I brought a double lunch in excellent foresight of this exact problem." She gestured toward the door. "Let's go outside and eat on the lawn. I think I saw the sun briefly before I was sentenced to a day of hell this morning."

For a moment he just stood there and dreamily watched her walk away, until Fang came up behind him and nudged his arm.

"Nice catch," Fang said, grinning. "You just gonna stand there staring at her all day?"

Iggy flushed and glared at Fang. "No. And what are you doing standing here? Shouldn't you be chasing after your own girl?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Fang said, but with a definite air of I-know-exactly-what-you're-talking-about-now-shut-up.

"Right," Iggy said skeptically, playing along. "Because I _didn't_ hear all about your little redhead a few weeks back."

Fang looked a little surprised. "You were talking about Lissa?"

"Um, yeah," Iggy said, frowning. "Are you two-timing her or something?"

"Oh…no." Fang looked a little distracted. "No, I'd have to be going out with her to do that."

Before Iggy could ask what exactly was going on with Fang, though, Tess stuck her head back inside the cafeteria and called, "Iggy! You coming?"

Clearly glad to have a way out of the conversation, Fang gave Iggy a slight push toward the doors. "Go on, Romeo. Have fun."

With one last puzzled glance back at Fang, Iggy made his way over to Tess.

"Sorry," he said. "Got talking."

"That's fine," she said easily. "You didn't miss lunch, so it's all good."

Iggy smiled. "Wouldn't want to miss lunch. That would just be horrible."

* * *

**64**

Darkness.

It was Angel's only companion. It had been for a while now. They'd taken her away after the flock had fought the guards and they'd thrown her in this cell. She'd been fed and watered, but was never allowed to leave the cell. She huddled in the corner, wishing for light, for the flock, for Max. If Max had been there, she would have held Angel, comforted her. That was what Max did. When Angel was unhappy, Max tried to make it better.

But Max wasn't there. No one was. It was only Angel.

So she sat, and waited for someone to rescue her.

* * *

**A/N: It's kinda short, but I figured that a short chapter was better than no chapter at all. The Iggy bit took me forever, because, being home schooled, I have a very hard time writing in high school settings. Anyway, I'm sorry this chapter took so long. The next may not be much better though, because I have absolutely no idea how to get from where I am now in the story to where I know the story needs to go. I'm sure I'll figure it out, but in the meantime, please don't give up on me!**

**Reviews are much loved, as per usual. I don't think that'll ever change, honestly. =)**


	8. Plans

**A/N: How is it that twelve people have this story on their alerts, and yet I only got three reviews for the last chapter? I mean, I used to say that I didn't care if people reviewed or not, but I have to say, it really makes me way more likely to update. My stories that _don't_ get reviewed only get updated every two or three months, so...if you don't want that to happen to this story, review! Please! Is it really too much to ask?**

**And now that I've had my rant, happy reading.  
**

* * *

**65**

I spent three days trying to avoid Fang, and let me tell you, those were a long three days. It's really hard to avoid someone when they live in the same house that you do. Finally, he cornered me in the hallway again.

"Have you made up your mind yet?" he asked quietly, watching me in a way that was a little unnerving in its intensity.

I shifted uncomfortably. "I…I don't know. Give me some more time."

"No, Max," he said, sounding almost exasperated. "If you don't have an answer now, you never will. I think I know you well enough to know that." He paused. "Okay, changing tactics. I'm going to ask you some questions, and I want you to answer it with the absolute first thing that comes to your mind. And trust me, I'll know if you're lying."

"How?" I asked, completely aware that I was stalling.

He smirked. "I can read minds."

I raised an eyebrow at him. "No you can't."

"Nope," he agreed, "but I can practically read _yours_. If you hesitate at all, I'll know you're fudging it."

"Whatever." I sighed. "Ask away."

"Okay…What's your favorite color?"

"Dark blue."

"How old are you?"

"Fourteen."

"Are you happy to be living with Dr. Martinez and Ella?"

"Definitely."

"Do you want to go to school?"

"No."

"Do you want to go out with me?"

"No."

Fang raised his eyebrows. "See? Not that hard, really." He smiled a little. "See you around, Max."

Then, with me staring after him open-mouthed, he walked past me into the kitchen.

I didn't get it. After being so serious about the matter earlier, why was he suddenly fine with me saying no? Shouldn't he be at least a _little_ upset?

One thing was for sure, though; I was glad that the weight of his ultimatum was off my shoulders. No matter how I felt about him, I trusted my instincts enough to know that I was better off this way.

At least, that's what _most_ of my heart was saying…but I didn't really need to go soul-searching right now. Chocolate chip cookies awaited me.

* * *

**66**

"Well, that was unexpected," Professor Henry said, frowning at the viewing screen. "Who would have thought that Fang's feelings were completely unrequited?"

Doctor Jones shrugged. "At least we've got an answer. That should make it easier to mold Max's dream to fit her desires."

"Right," Professor Henry agreed. Then he sighed and walked over to Nudge's monitor. "Look at her," he said sadly. "She looks so happy, going to a normal school, being accepted by others…Why are we doing this to them?"

"You just said she was happy," Doctor Jones said, sounding confused, "but you sounded like you thought this was a horrible thing we were doing."

Professor Henry nodded. "It is." He turned to look at the doctor, gesturing to the screen. "This isn't real! We're making them live lives that they should never have lived!"

Doctor Jones still didn't get it. "But they're _happy_."

"I know," the professor said, sighing. "That just makes it worse. They're going to be so disappointed when we let them out and they realize it was all just a dream."

"Wait…what?" the doctor asked in surprise. "Who said we're letting them out?"

Professor Henry stared at him. "Were you planning on letting them live their lives out in paradise? Never letting them really see each other again?" He shook his head. "No, we can't do that. We have to fix this."

"And just how do you plan on doing that?" Doctor Jones asked skeptically.

Professor Henry frowned thoughtfully. "I don't quite know yet, but I think I may have an idea…"

"And what might that be?"

"Well, I though we could start by–"

He was interrupted by the opening of the lab door. They looked up to see Jeb entering, a large box in his arms.

"Good afternoon, gentlemen," Jeb said. "The Director has a job for you."

"Really?" Professor Henry asked, trying to keep the hostility he was currently feeling for the Director out of his voice. "What's that?"

"She wants you to fix Angel," Jeb replied. "She said that having a mind reader could be of use, but not when the mind reader thinks she's only two years old." He set the box down on a table. "Some potentially useful items have been collected and are in this box."

A thought struck the professor, but he tried very hard to keep his excitement inward. "I see."

Jeb looked at him suspiciously. "Everything alright, Professor? You're not thinking of…_doing_ anything, are you?"

Professor Henry raised his eyebrows in what he hoped was a innocently baffled way. "No, sir. Of course not."

"Good." With one last look at them, Jeb turned around and left the lab. As soon as he did, the professor turned to Doctor Jones.

"I've got it," he said triumphantly. "I know _exactly_ what we're going to do."

* * *

**67**

When the door first opened, Angel's eyes screamed in agony. After so long in the dark, the light was torture on them. She squinted up at the person who came in, but all she saw was a large, shadowy shape. She hugged her knees closer to her chest, tears leaking out the corners of her agonized eyes.

"Come over here, Angel," a gentle voice said. "I'm not going to hurt you. I promise."

Angel whimpered softly. "Eyes hurt," she whispered.

"I know, honey, I know." The shape came closer. "I'm so sorry that this happened to you, but I'm going to make it all better, okay? The pain will go away soon, but I need you to come with me now. Can you do that?"

She nodded, and the shape bent down next to her.

"I'm going to have to carry you. Are you okay with that?"

She nodded again, and she felt herself being lifted into the air. She wondered if this was what it felt like to fly. She wished she could find someplace big and open to test her new, larger wings.

Her last thought before the methodical rhythm of the man's steps put her to sleep was of swooping and soaring over the fields of grass that she had seen in her picture books, and wishing that maybe it could come true.

* * *

**68**

Doctor Jones looked down at Angel's sleeping form. "You want her to do what?"

"Go into the others' minds," Professor Henry replied. "I think she can do it, and it won't be recorded in the computers as an entry, so the Director won't be able to pin it on us."

"And how will that help us?" the doctor asked. "We'll still have to wake them up."

The professor shook his head. "I don't think so. I think that if they have the drive, the flock can wake themselves up. Then we could make all of the necessary arrangements for them to escape, and the Director would never know it was us."

"So if Angel tells them that it's a dream and they need to wake up…" Doctor Jones said slowly.

"…then they can get themselves out," Professor Henry finished. "Exactly."

Doctor Jones smiled approvingly. "That could very well work. All we need to do is get Angel up to her normal intellectual capacity."

"That will be the tricky part, definitely," Professor Henry agreed, sighing. "Let's just hope we can manage it."

* * *

**A/N: And there's chapter eight. I hope no one gets mad at me for the end of 65...  
**


	9. Pangs

**A/N: Hey, it's been less than two weeks since my last update. Is it sad that that's pretty good for me? Oh well. **

**Anywho, here's chapter nine.  
**

* * *

**69**

It took me no time at all to fall back into the platonic, got-your-back relationship that I'd had with Fang before I'd gone and kissed him on that beach in New York. It was easy. Almost too easy. Whenever I stopped to think about it, I realized that it all felt sort of unresolved. But Fang didn't seem to feel it, so I ignored it, like I'm so good at doing when it comes to feelings. Besides, I was happy enough with the rest of my life that I didn't really feel like stopping to think about the more confusing aspects of it.

Until one Monday morning, anyway. Though 'morning' was a relative term for me. Now that we were perfectly safe, I'd taken to getting up around nine o'clock, and you couldn't count on me being ready for anything until at least noon. So when I say 'Monday morning', I really meant around twelve-thirty or one.

"Hello, Max," Dr. Martinez said cheerfully, coming into the kitchen with her arms full of grocery bags. "I see you're finally up."

"Yeah, yeah," I said, yawning. "I'm a lazy bum, I know."

She smiled at me. "Quite." She turned around and started distributing her purchases onto their respective shelves in the cupboard.

I was about to offer to help when a sudden pain hit me like a hammer in the stomach. It felt like something was crawling around inside me, poking the walls of my stomach with something sharp. Gasping, I sank into the nearest chair, clutching my middle with both arms.

Hearing my exclamation, Dr. M turned around, a surprised look on her face. "Max? Are you alright?"

I shook my head mutely, the sharp pain making it hard for me to talk.

She frowned. "What's wrong?"

"Stomach," I managed. "Sharp…pain."

"Are you sure?" she asked. What kind of question was that?

I looked at her as indignantly as I could manage. "_Yes_."

"Okay, okay," she said, obviously getting the message. "Well…can you make it to the couch at least? It's closer than your room."

I nodded, hoping I was telling the truth.

I was, pretty much. I managed it, at least, but it wasn't pleasant. Gazzy was on the couch happily watching cartoons, but he jumped up as soon as we came in.

"What's wrong with Max?" he asked Dr. M, the worry evident in his tone.

Dr. M shook her head. "I have no idea. Go get the Tylenol out of the bathroom cabinet for me, please."

Gazzy scurried out of the room, and I flopped gratefully onto the couch, moaning. Dr. M crouched down next me, her expression anxious.

"Has anything like this ever happened to you before?" she asked.

I shook my head, not even having to think about it. Our health was incredible. None of us had ever gotten sick before. Injured, sure, but never sick.

So what was wrong with me now?

* * *

**70**

"Jones, get your ass in here now!" Professor Henry commanded into his headset. "We have a situation!"

The speakers crackled to life, the doctor's voice coming through loud and clear and annoyed. "But I think I've got something on Angel's case. Possibly breakthrough material."

"Trust me on this one," Professor Henry said. "You want to be here for this."

He had been watching Max's monitor when she'd suddenly grimaced and dropped into a chair. He had quickly turned the mute off and watched as Dr. Martinez helped her to the couch.

Something wasn't right.

By the time Doctor Jones burst into the lab, the entire flock had gathered around Max, all of them worried. The professor was worried too. It was weird enough that she'd gotten sick with her impeccable immune system, but one, it wasn't a normal illness, and two, the machines that were keeping them in their separate fantasies was also supposed to regulate things like this so that nothing would affect their perfect life.

"This had better be good," the doctor said, his breath rather short from running all the way to the lab.

"Not good, no," Professor Henry said, frowning. "More on the bad side, I think." He pointed to the monitor. "Have a look."

Doctor Jones squinted at the screen. "What's wrong with her?"

"Extreme stomach pain," the professor replied. "Sharp and debilitating, apparently."

"That's not good," Doctor Jones said.

Professor Henry raised an eyebrow at him. "Thank you, Captain Obvious. The question is, why is it happening?"

"Maybe the machine is malfunctioning," the doctor suggested. "They aren't exactly well-tested."

Professor Henry shrugged. "Maybe, but I doubt it. They may not be well-tested, but they're certainly well-built. It seems odd for it to be acting up so soon."

"Soon?" Doctor Jones said. "It's been nearly three weeks."

"I know," the professor said. "Don't you generally expect things like this to last at least a couple years? We're in the timeframe now where they've been running long enough that we know they work fine and therefore aren't malfunctioning, and are obviously too new to be breaking down already."

The doctor inclined his head, conceding the point. "So what could be the problem?"

"I'm guessing," Professor Henry said, "that it's more a problem with Max's brain than with the machine." He typed a few lines of code into the computer that was connected to Max's monitor, opening up an information screen. He scanned it quickly, then looked up at the doctor. "Right here," he said. "It seems to be having trouble holding onto Max's consciousness. I'm going to take a wild guess and say that she'll start having hallucinations of the lab soon if we don't do something."

Doctor Jones shook his head, frowning. "This doesn't make sense. They were hooked up to a very similar machine for _four years_, and we never had any problems like this."

"They were all together then," the professor said. "Maybe that helped to strengthen the link or something. That's not really the point; the point is that we need to get them out fast before Max's brain overloads our system. I don't think we'd be able to hide _that_ from the Director, do you?"

"No," Doctor Jones agreed, "probably not."

"Right then," Professor Henry said. "We'll shoot Max up with some painkillers to stop a bit of the agony, but then we really need to get Angel up and going."

Doctor Jones nodded. "Let's get to work."

* * *

**71**

The pain was awful, and only getting worse. It had spread into my chest, and it felt like a large dog was sitting there, making it hard to breathe. Obviously, as the great Maximum Ride, I wasn't crying, but with every passing moment of this, the tears got closer.

Dr. M was trying to help, but the most she seemed able to do was give me a couple Tylenols and hope that they would make it a little less awful. From what I could tell, they had done absolutely nothing.

Fang was sitting in a chair next to me, one of his hands wrapped around mine. I didn't care about where our relationship was at the moment, it was just good to have someone there.

I looked up at him. "Thank you," I said, my voice hoarse.

He looked surprised. "What for?"

"Being here, I guess."

He smiled. "You know I've got your back, Max. No matter what."

"Thanks for that, then," I said, then winced as more pain hit my stomach. "Ow."

His smile faded. "I wish I could help."

"I wish you could, too," I said. "Anything to make this pain go–" I stopped, surprised.

"What is it?" Fang asked. "Did it get worse?"

I shook my head, a grin spreading slowly over my face. "No, it…it went away." I swung my legs over the side of the couch and stood up, stretching. "It's gone."

He raised his eyebrows. "Weird."

"Yeah," I agreed. "Definitely not normal, but hey, I'm not going to complain." I grinned at him. "Wanna go for a fly?"

He grinned back. "Why not?"

* * *

**A/N: Hm...I have nothing to say. I don't even need this AN, except then I'd have no place to say that I have nothing to say...and I must be going insane. Jeesh. (muttering) No place to say I have nothing to say...Feh.**


	10. Raindrops

**A/N: Hello, folks! How's your day going?**

**Elvira: That's stupid. Who really says "folks"?**

**...(sigh) I guess I'd better introduce you all to Elvira, my inner critic. I made the mistake of naming her a few days ago, and now she won't shut up. My apologies. I'll just get on with the chapter before she can make any more wonderfully pithy remarks.  
**

* * *

**72**

"Hey, Fang," Max said cheerfully, bumping his shoulder with her own. "How's life?"

He smiled at her. "What do you think?"

"Okay, point taken," she said, shaking her head. Then she looked up at him. "You wanna go somewhere?"

"Somewhere?"

"Yeah, you know…somewhere."

He shrugged. "Why not?"

She grabbed his hand, and he followed her as she led him through the jungle, away from the flock's camp site. Finally, she seemed to decide that she'd found a decent place, and she stopped and turned around. Then she sat down at the base of a tree and patted the ground next to her, and he dropped down to sit next her.

"Hey, Max?" Fang said after a couple minutes of comfortable silence, a thought suddenly occurring to him. "Have you noticed that it never rains here?"

She shrugged. "So?"

"So it's a tropical island," he replied. "It's supposed to rain. A lot. And it hasn't yet."

She shrugged again. "So?"

He frowned at her. "You don't think that's just the slightest bit odd?"

"Fang," she said, sounding exasperated. "It's paradise here. Do you have to worry about little things like rain?"

"Rain isn't a little thing," he protested. "Rain is what makes the plants grow. Rain is what stops the whole world from being a desert. Rain is necessary for the continued survival of our race. I don't like it when it doesn't rain."

She sighed. "Okay, Fang. Whatever."

It almost sounded to Fang like she was saying, 'Fine, I give up. Have your rain.' But that was stupid. Max didn't control the weather. She was probably just saying, 'Fine, worry about the rain if you have to'.

And then a drop of water landed on Fang's arm. Looking up, he saw that it had started to rain.

Max smiled at him. "Are you happy now, Fang?"

"Yeah, sure," he said vaguely, staring up at the torrent of raindrops that had started dripping down through the leafy canopy.

Something very fishy was going on here.

* * *

**73**

Iggy was having a wonderful day.

It was a Saturday, and it was brilliantly sunny and pleasantly warm, and Tess was with him. And not just with him…she was _with _him. They were sitting on a park bench, his arm draped around her shoulders, and he was so happy he thought he was going to pop. Any minute now, he expected someone to say, "Oh, no, Iggy's too happy, better do something", and it would all go away.

But it hadn't happened yet, and he wasn't about to let that sort of pessimistic thinking ruin his day.

"Iggy?" Tess asked drowsily, leaning her head on his shoulder.

"Yeah?"

She lifted her head a bit to look up at him. "Have you ever had a day that was just too good to be true?"

No way. She could _not_ be thinking the same thing he was. Grinning, he replied, "Definitely. I was just in the process of classifying this one as exactly that."

She beamed at him. "Me too. What a coincidence."

Iggy was about to reply when he noticed a slight pain creeping up the back of his neck. He frowned and raised a hand to rub the muscles there, hoping he could make it go away.

Tess noticed his movement and sat up to look at him properly. "You okay?"

He nodded, still rubbing the back of his neck. "Just some tense muscles, I think."

"Tense muscles?" she asked. "Aren't those generally stress-induced?"

Iggy shrugged. "If you say so."

Tess raised an eyebrow. "Are you stressed right now?"

"Not in the least," he replied. "Why?"

She just looked at him for a minute, and he finally realized what she was getting at.

"Oh. Right." He shrugged again. "Weird."

She sank back against the bench. "Yeah. Weird."

He was about to brush the whole thing off when the creeping pain suddenly shot up into the base of his skull. Yelping embarrassingly, he brought both hands up behind his head, pressing his fingertips into the very top of his neck. It eased the pain, but only slightly.

"Iggy?" Tess looked very concerned. "Iggy, are you sure you're okay?"

His eyes were starting to water from the pain, but he managed a short nod. "I've been worse, trust me."

And that was the thing; he had been in much more pain than this before, but for some reason this pain was bad in a completely different way. Bruises and cuts were one thing, but internal head pain? It was completely unknown territory, and his head wasn't at all used to it.

_I should ask Max what she did to help her brain attacks,_ he thought, but then remembered that Max hadn't really done anything during those. She'd just sort of curled up and moaned. He really hoped that wasn't what was happening to him, because that had been beyond embarrassing, and he hadn't even been the one doing the moaning.

But just as he was wondering if he was going to have to blow off the rest of his date with Tess, the pain receded, leaving only a shadow of itself behind. He rolled his neck a couple times, just to be sure.

"It's gone," he reported. "I'm good."

Tess's eyebrows contracted, her expression confused. "That was really strange, Iggy."

He grinned. "What can I say? I'm a strange person." _Just wait until you see the wings_.

* * *

**74**

"Another crisis, momentarily diverted," Professor Henry muttered to himself. Why was this all happening at once? Just as Doctor Jones had discovered something that he believed to be the key to Angel's recovery, Gazzy, Nudge, and Iggy had started reacting to the machines in the same way Max had, and Professor Henry had been forced to run around giving them all a good dose of pain killers.

He went back over to the laptop he'd been working on and opened a new text file. He put the date and time at the top, then began typing.

_Gazzy, Nudge, and Iggy reacted to machines. Anesthetics applied. All brain activities normal. No idea yet as to what could be causing this problem. Fang still unaffected. Doctor Jones on the verge of discovery. Angel to be treated ASA_

He stopped typing as the radio on the desk nearby suddenly squawked to life.

"Professor, I've got it!" Doctor Jones' voice was verging on ecstatic. "I've figured it out!"

"I'm going to assume that you're talking about Angel?" the professor asked dryly.

"Of course, of course." Apparently the doctor was too excited to even be annoyed by such questions. "I've treated her, and she should be up and going in a couple hours."

Professor Henry was impressed. "That soon?"

"Yes," Doctor Jones replied. "Are you ready? We've got to get this plan going, you know. You were the one saying, 'The sooner the better'."

"I know." Professor Henry rubbed a hand across his face. "Okay, come up to the lab. We'll get started immediately."

As he turned the radio off, the professor sent a silent plea up to whoever would listen that they would pull this off without a disaster, because if he were being honest with himself, he would have to admit that their chances didn't look particularly good.

* * *

**A/N: Okay, so...Is anyone reading the Hunger Games series? Because Mockingjay, the third and final book, came out Tuesday. I just got it today, and I am _freaking psyched_ about it. I absolutely can't wait to read it, which I shall commence to doing as soon as a get a free moment. I've been waiting for this book since last summer, and it's finally here! (does Dance of Joy)**

**Anyway, reviews are always lovely. =)  
**


	11. Penetration

**A/N: I'm rather proud of how quickly I updated this time. It didn't take me two or three weeks. _And_ I've got the next chapter written already, because I had a really good weekend, writing-wise. I think I must've written at least seven thousand words, for various fanfics and stories. (pats self on back)**

**Anyway, you people probably don't want to listen to me blab about how great I am, so I'll just shut up and let you read. =)  
**

* * *

**75**

Angel was flying, high above the clouds. She was swooping and soaring and diving and spiraling through the air. She was reveling in the wonderful feeling of having complete control over where she went, not having to be stuck to the ground all the time.

Then she realized, _I've done this before._ She knew it. Suddenly, it wasn't so amazing. It was just…normal. It was still fun, and still very freeing, but no longer the awe-inspiring thing it had been just moments ago.

Then she remembered that she wasn't two years old. She was six. She had lived in a house in the mountains with the rest of the flock for four years. She had learned to fly. She had been to New York City. She had found a dog named Total, and he could talk.

The memories rushed over her, leaving her brain feeling full, but strangely right. And then the fullness left. The memories settled back into their rightful places, and she was Angel again. The sweet little six-year-old mind reader.

What had happened? Why had she forgotten everything?

"Angel."

She heard her name being called, but it sounded very far away, and she didn't see anyone nearby. She flapped a couple times, keeping herself aloft, and looked around. Nothing.

"Angel."

There it was again. She frowned.

"Angel, wake up."

Wake up? Was she asleep, then? She looked down curiously, and that was when she realized that there was no Earth beneath her. She was floating in a blue, cloudy dreamland, with absolutely nothing to catch her if she fell. The thought was a little bit terrifying.

A new voice, concerned and anxious. "Maybe she reacted badly to the treatment."

The first voice again. "Her vitals are good. I think she's just tired."

_Yes,_ she thought. _I _am_ tired…but it seems like those voices really want me to wake up._ The trouble was, she didn't know how. She'd never had a dream like this before, so clear and real. She'd never heard people telling her to wake up, and then not actually being able to obey. What should she do?

"Angel, come on. Wake up."

She looked down. Whenever she had one of those dreams with the endless falling, it always woke her up. That was probably worth a shot.

"Angel, please. Wake. Up."

She closed her wings and fell backward through the clouds.

* * *

**76**

"Oh, she's coming to," Doctor Jones said, his voice relieved.

"What did I tell you?" Professor Henry said. "She was just tired."

Angel blinked and sat up. "Where am I?"

"You're in a lab," the professor told her. "We've just cured you. How do you feel?"

"Cured me?" she asked, her expression puzzled. "There was something wrong with me?" Then her eyes became guarded. "That's what the Whitecoat said, in the room with all the funny green smoke. She said she was going to fix me."

Professor Henry nodded. "I know. She tried to. It didn't work properly. Your mind became jumbled, and you thought you were two years old again. _That's_ what we've just cured you of."

"So…" Angel thought for a moment, looking very confused. "You helped me? You're not bad Whitecoats?"

Professor Henry shrugged. "We're trying not to be. We cured you so you could help us free your, uh…your flock."

Her eyes widened. "My flock? Where are they?"

Sighing, Professor Henry set about explaining the situation. When he was done, Angel just looked at him for a moment. Then she said, "Oh."

"Will you help us?"

She nodded. "Uh-huh. They're my family."

"Good." Professor Henry looked over at the doctor. "Let's get back up there, then."

* * *

**77**

"So, the first thing I want you to do is to try to connect to his mind," Doctor Jones said, indicating the comatose Gazzy. "Once you manage that, we'll go from there."

Angel studied her brother. "Why him first?"

"We think he'll be easiest to retrieve," Professor Henry said. "He was the hardest to figure out, so his paradise isn't as tailored to his desires as the other four. He'll be the most likely to be okay with leaving it."

She walked around to the other side of Gazzy's bed. "Okay. So I just…read his mind?"

The professor nodded. "For now."

They watched as she closed her eyes, a look of concentration on her face. After a moment, she murmured, "He's playing with another boy. They're chasing each other. They're laughing. He's thinking how much fun this is, and how much he wishes there was another boy his age in the flock. He's thinking how much he misses the flock." Her eyes snapped open. "You separated him from the flock?"

"Not intentionally," Doctor Jones said. "We only set the foundations. After that, the machine does most of the work of keeping them happy." He frowned. "Admittedly, that may not have been such a brilliant idea. I don't think the machines are particularly…tactful."

Angel cocked her head. "Huh?"

He waved his hand dismissively. "Never mind. Do you think you can get in?"

"Don't know. I've never tried to do anything like that before." She looked at them. "You want me to go into his dream, right?"

"That would be helpful, yes," Professor Henry agreed. "Just try it, okay? If it doesn't work, we'll think of something else." He wasn't exactly telling the truth, because he really didn't have a back-up plan. Well, maybe "unplug the machines and hope the flock can get themselves oriented quick enough to fight their way out of here before someone hears the alarm and comes in to sedate them", which really wasn't much of a plan. But Angel didn't need to know all that.

Angel nodded and closed her eyes. Then she opened them again. "Can I have a chair?"

The professor laughed. "Of course." He brought one over from one of the desks and set it down next to her. "There you go."

She sat down and closed her eyes again. A few moments later, her breathing evened out and her head leaned back against the chair. She seemed to be asleep. The professor watched her anxiously, a surprising amount of concern making itself known. He had no real reason to be worried about the girl, and yet he was. What if something went wrong inside the machine? What if Gazzy reacted badly and something happened? What if, what if, what if?

Why was he even stressing about it?

"Hey, there she is!" Doctor Jones exclaimed. "She's on the monitor!"

Professor Henry hurried over. There she was, talking urgently to Gazzy, who was just looking at her in confusion.

"Turn the sound on," the professor said, and the doctor obeyed.

"…can fight it!" Angel was saying. "Please, Gazzy, why would I lie to you? They're making you dream stuff that isn't true. You have to get out of here. If you fight it, they say it'll make you wake up."

"They?" Gazzy asked skeptically. "You mean the Whitecoats?"

"Yes," Angel said, "but not the bad ones. They're trying to help us. They're re…" She paused, a frustrated look crossing her face. "What's that word Max says when she's talking about fighting the School?"

"Rebelling?" Gazzy suggested, and a comforted look of familiarity settled itself on his face.

Angel's brow smoothed. "Yeah. That one. That's what these Whitecoats are doing."

Gazzy smiled. "Okay. I believe you."

"You do?" Angel hugged him. "Thank you. Now can you get out?"

"Dunno." He closed his eyes and scrunched his face up in concentration. After a minute, he opened his eyes again. When he saw that his surroundings were the same as they had been, he frowned with disappointment. "It's not working."

"Let me help," Angel said. "Maybe I can push your thoughts the right way and make this world seem less real."

"Okay," he agreed, and a couple minutes later, they had both disappeared from the monitor.

Professor Henry went back over to the bed, a smile unable to keep itself off his face. Angel and Gazzy were both waking up.

"Did we do it?" Gazzy asked groggily.

"Yes, yes you did," Doctor Jones said. "Congratulations, both of you."

Angel was almost immediately wide awake. "Who's next?" she asked eagerly.

* * *

**A/N: Oh, I finished Mockingjay, and would really like to talk about it, so if any of you guys have read it, let me know.  
**


	12. Intrusion

**A/N: How is everyone? For some reason, I feel the need to have some sort of AN at both ends of my chapters so they don't look empty. So I seem to be filling this space with a whole bunch of waffle because I have nothing to say. I'll shut up now.  
**

* * *

**78**

Iggy didn't want to leave.

He and Tess had spent the entire afternoon at the mall, and while normally that would be very far from his idea of a good time, somehow she made it fun. She only pointed out the interesting stores, and they spent most of their time just walking around.

Unfortunately, every day had to end sometime.

"I'll see you tomorrow," Tess said. "At school."

"I know," Iggy grumbled. "I still don't want to leave. This is honestly one of the best days I've ever had."

"Has it topped your other best day yet?" she teased, punching his arm playfully. "You know, the one in the park?"

He shrugged. "Maybe. Maybe not. They're good for different reasons."

She took his hand and tugged him gently toward the mall's exit. "Come on. They close soon. We have to go."

He let her tow him along, until they finally made it out into the night air. They walked back in the direction on both of their houses, heading for Tess's house first. Iggy had always heard that it was the guy who was supposed to walk the girl home.

They both stopped at the end of her sidewalk and just looked at each other. Then, very unexpectedly, Tess leaned up and kissed him gently.

"Thanks for today," she said quietly, then turned and walked quickly up to her door. She glanced back and smiled at him, then disappeared into the house.

He just stood there, watching her house for a long time. Finally he shook himself out of his dreamy stupor and headed home.

When he got back, his mother was waiting for him in the dining room.

"Took you long enough," she said, smiling. "Did you have a nice time?"

Iggy grinned. "You could say that."

Her eyes glinted in a way that told Iggy she knew exactly what he meant, but she didn't say anything other than, "That's good."

Still unable to keep the grin off his face, he went out into the backyard and flopped down in a lawn chair. He didn't feel like going to bed just yet. In fact, he felt wide awake. But even if he hadn't, what happened next certainly would have woken him up.

Suddenly and without warning, Angel materialized not twenty feet in front of him.

He jumped up and yelled, "Holy crap!"

"James?" His mother's voice floated out of the window, sounding concerned. "Is everything alright out there?"

"Uh…yeah," he called back, trying not to let his voice shake. "Fine. Just…stubbed my toe."

"Okay, well, be careful."

"Sure thing, Mom." He turned to Angel and lowered his voice. "How the hell did you get here?"

She looked very, very serious. "Iggy, I have to tell you something, and you won't like it."

He raised his eyebrows. "What? You developed the power of teleportation?"

"No," she said. Then, taking a deep breath, she said, "You're living a dream."

He was confused, but he smiled and said, "I know. It's amazing, isn't it?"

Her expression became distressed. "No, Iggy! That's not what I meant. I meant, this isn't real. The School has you hooked up to a machine, and it's creating your perfect paradise. This life isn't real."

His smile faded. "What? What do you mean?"

"You have to get out of here, Iggy," she said urgently. "Two of the Whitecoats are helping us, and they have a plan for us to escape, but that plan won't work if they have to unplug you. If you deny your dream and fight your own way out, the alarms won't sound, and we can get out. Please, Iggy."

She sounded so mature. He wondered when she'd grown up so much.

Of course, he didn't really care. He was too busy being angry.

"No, Angel," he said. "I'm not leaving. For the first time in over ten years, I can _see_. I have a girlfriend who just k–" He stopped and shook his head. "Never mind. But I'm telling you, I'm not leaving. I haven't been this happy in a long time, and you want me to _deny_ it?" He took a couple steps back. "No. I won't."

"Iggy, please!" she said, her voice rising. "We need you!"

He glanced at the house. "Keep it down, Angel. My mother will hear you."

"So?" she asked defiantly. "She's not real!"

"I don't care," Iggy said coldly. "I don't care if this life isn't real, it's better than what's out there." He turned and stormed back into the house, slamming the door behind him. His mother looked up curiously.

"Are you okay, sweetie?" she asked.

He nodded shortly, then stormed up the stairs. When he got to his room, he glanced out the window that overlooked the backyard.

Angel was gone.

* * *

**80**

"No!" Angel jumped up from her chair. "No, Iggy!" She looked over to where Gazzy, Nudge, Professor Henry, and Doctor Jones were standing. They all looked at her sympathetically, so she guessed they'd been watching the monitor while she'd tried to persuade Iggy. She sighed. "What now?"

Doctor Jones shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe we can get the others out first and then unplug him at the last minute. That way they can maybe get him out before the alarms draw the guards."

"Will that work?" Nudge asked. "It won't be a surprise that way. What if there are guards right nearby and they come in and catch us all? Or maybe they've got a button that they can click somewhere that'll close the doors or trap us all in nets. Or–"

"Nudge," Gazzy said. "I'm scared enough already."

She looked down. "Sorry."

Professor Henry patted her on the shoulder. "Don't worry. We'll manage this. It's just going to take a bit of–"

A loud knock at the door interrupted him. His eyes widened in horror.

"Get back on your beds!" Doctor Jones hissed. "Quickly!"

"What about me?" Angel asked.

"You're supposed to be here," the doctor replied. "We were supposed to be curing you. Just…sit in that chair and try to act naïve."

She obeyed, but she wasn't exactly known for her great acting. How was she supposed to pull this off? She barely remembered being two years old. She just hoped that whoever was knocking didn't plan on talking to her.

As soon as Gazzy and Nudge looked comatose again, Professor Henry rushed over to open the door just as the person outside knocked again. He pulled it open quickly, and Jeb came into the lab.

Angel felt a deep and unusual hatred rise up inside her. Why had Jeb pretended to be on their side, then betrayed them? Even if that had never actually happened, she still hated him. She'd thought of him as a father, and the whole time, he'd been pretending.

"Doctor, Professor," Jeb greeted. "How are things going here?"

"Fine, sir," Doctor Jones said. "Is there something you want?"

Jeb smiled. "No, nothing in particular. Just wanted to make sure everything was okay down here. You haven't touched base with us in a while." He paused, as if trying to remember an elusive fact. "I believe it's been…a week? Week and a half? Two, maybe?"

"I'm sorry, sir," Professor Henry said. "We were very involved in our work."

"And how's your work going?" Jeb asked, then seemed to notice Angel sitting there. "Oh, there she is. Have you managed to fix her little problem yet?"

"Uh…not yet," Doctor Jones said. "We're still working on it."

Jeb walked over to where Angel was and squatted down so he was on her level. "And how are you today, Angel?"

Forcing her hatred down, she smiled blandly and said, "Good", trying to make her voice sound as childish as possible.

"Excellent," he said. "I'll see you later then." He ruffled her hair and stood up, turning around. "I guess I'll leave you to it."

He headed for the door, and they all relaxed a bit, glad that nothing worse had happened.

It was then that Iggy's monitor chose to emit the noise of an opening door and his mother's voice, saying, "James, dear, are you sure you're okay?"

Professor Henry rushed over and turned the mute on. "I'm sorry. We must've left it on."

Jeb frowned. "I see." He headed for the bank of monitors.

Professor Henry tensed visibly. "It's nothing, I assure you. Just didn't turn the mute back on."

"Of course," Jeb said smiling, then pushed the professor roughly out of the way. He looked at the monitors for a long moment, then turned around. "Why are Gazzy and Nudge not on their screens?"

Professor Henry swallowed nervously. "Um, well…I changed the focal point to look at some other things." Unfortunately, it came out sounding much more like a question than a confidant statement.

Jeb raised an eyebrow. "I see." He went over to Nudge's bed. He looked at her for a minute, then pulled a razor blade out of his pocket and cut into her upper arm.

There was nothing Nudge could do. Her automatic reactions kicked in, and she opened her eyes and gasped in pain.

Jeb was furious. "What are they doing awake?" He said it calmly, but the threat in it was as obvious as a clown in the School.

"Oh, uh…" Doctor Jones trailed off, apparently not coming up with a good enough excuse.

"I think you two are in for a very, very unpleasant rest of your lives," Jeb said, his voice barely under control.

Angel gulped. That sounded very, very bad.

* * *

**A/N: How about a bit more waffle? 'Cause I still have nothing to say. At least I haven't handed the keyboard over to Elvira...(scuffle breaks out) Hang on. I'm trying to sedate her. She really wan**

**Elvira: Spell check exists! Imagination kills clichés! No f  
**

**Ahem. Sorry. I've got her...restrained now. You didn't really want to hear a whole bunch of critical ranting, did you? I didn't think so.**

**...Review?  
**


	13. Realization

**A/N: This is my last prewritten chapter. Now I actually have to remember to write more or I won't be able to post. =P  
**

* * *

**81**

A week after the stomach pain came an awful, debilitating headache. It hit suddenly, and at first I thought I was having another brain attack. Somehow, despite the agony, I managed to identify enough differences between the two pains to know that wasn't what it was.

I stumbled back toward the house, trying not to collapse. Why had I thought it was such a good idea to go for a fly, again? I kept moving, one foot, then the other. Finally, I couldn't take it any longer, and I sank against a tree, shaking. I knew I was quite far from the house, and no one was going to come looking for me for at least a few more hours.

I had two options: One, ignore the pain and keep moving, which was seeming less and less possible the longer I sat here. Two, stay here and hope the pain went away. The problem really was that I didn't know what had caused this, so I had no idea if it was going to fix itself without some sort of medical care. Sleep was supposed to fix anything, but I didn't think I'd be able to doze off with this thumping, throbbing, shooting pain bouncing around inside my head.

That was when I started hallucinating. I was just staring blankly into the forest, trying not to pass out, when the trees suddenly disappeared. Instead of the greens and browns that I had been looking at, I was looking at a bright white ceiling. Then I was back in the forest.

_This can't be good,_ I thought vaguely.

It happened a few more times, each time lasting a little bit longer and giving me a few more details of the room I was seeing. The fourth time, I managed to identify it.

The School.

Why was I hallucinating the School? And worse, why did my hallucinations suddenly feel more real than the trees around me? It almost felt like the last shreds of a dream falling away, revealing what was going on in the waking world. Like my eyelids were opening ever so slightly, only to close again, not really letting me wake up properly. But that was ridiculous, wasn't it?

Then I remembered. Before we had moved in with the Martinez's, I had had a dream. Once I'd woken up, and Dr. M had told me that it was just the Valium, I had dismissed it, and quickly forgotten about it. Now it came back to me, all those details that I'd tried to forget. Being captured by the School, being told that it was all a dream.

What if…?

No. It couldn't be true. I wouldn't let myself believe it. I was too happy here, in this world.

_Too good to be true,_ my mind whispered. _The whole thing was just too good to be true._

So was I not allowed to be happy? Was anything good that happened to me automatically a lie? That was too awful to be true…I hoped. Thinking about it, though, little pieces of the puzzle started falling into place. I tried to organize them into a mental list.

One: Fang's odd behavior; serious and forceful straight to complete nonchalance about our relationship. It was completely unlike him to give up so easily.

Two: The stomach pain that had vanished oddly and without reason.

Three: The fact that absolutely nothing bad had happened since we'd moved into the Martinez's. No one had tracked us down and tried to capture us. No one had tried to kill us. No weird mutants had come after us.

And then there were just the random feelings I'd been getting, the ones that indicated that something wasn't right. I'd ignored them, as I tend to do with things when I think they're not important. I'd never really thought of myself as unobservant, but now I realized how much I was just that. Sure, I checked every exit when I walked into a room and catalogued every item that could be used as a weapon, but that really wasn't the same thing as actually realizing what was going on around me. Honestly, I could be blinder than Iggy sometimes.

Another glimpse of the School, and this time I saw a person, too. It looked like…Jeb? He was standing over me, and for the first time I noticed a loud beeping noise coming from beside my head. I don't know if he noticed my eyes flicker open or not, but then I was back in the woods, my heart beating erratically.

Was Jeb doing something to me? Was he the one making me snap in and out like this?

The fact that I was even asking these questions made me realize something: Whether I thought it was logical or not, I believed that I was really lying in the School, somehow being made to believe that I was living in paradise.

I struggled to my feet. My new discovery gave me strength, and I began my journey back to the house again, one sentence repeating itself over and over in my mind:

_Too good to be true, too good to be true, too good to be true…_

* * *

**82**

Iggy was furious. Why could Angel not have just left him alone?

Now that she'd come in and disrupted his perfect life, everything had changed. He didn't mean for it to change. In fact, he had tried very hard not to let it. But now he noticed everything. It was like he was seeing his world through a completely different set of eyes.

He noticed when he asked Tess if she was free on Friday night to go to a concert with him, and she said, "Of course I'm free", which really made it sound like, "Why wouldn't I be?"

He noticed when the skies were clear and the temperature was perfect for the concert.

He noticed when he handed in an assignment a day late at school and the teacher just said, "That's fine. Life can get away from us sometimes, can't it?"

He noticed everything, and it bugged the hell out of him.

Why couldn't he just be oblivious? All he wanted was to pull the veil back over his eyes and go on living like he had been; utterly happy. But he couldn't. It just didn't work that way. He was forced to actually consider everything that Angel had said, and he was also forced to remember something that he had tried so very hard to forget.

The Dream.

He'd labeled it as such and stuffed it into the back of his brain, but that much detail and that much lost time was extremely difficult to forget. He figured that if Angel was telling the truth, then that dream must really have been reality, or at least, the part of it that hadn't been another dream. That was the outside world that he had actually lived in, before being put into this one.

If he bothered to ask himself, he knew that the life he was living now was the false one, that Angel _had_ been telling the truth. The problem was, he couldn't make himself want to leave. He knew that at some point, he would have to. He couldn't just stay locked up in the School forever. It would kill the rest of his flock to leave him there.

But he also knew that he couldn't make himself want to be blind again, or to leave Tess. He didn't even know if Tess really existed out in the real world, or if they'd just made her up for the test. Even if she did exist, it was highly doubtful that she would actually want anything to do with him.

And the blindness…He just couldn't face it. Any kind of living was better than living blind.

At least, that's what he convinced himself, so he did his best to pull the veil back down, and tried again to live the dream.

* * *

**A/N: Oh, wow. I just realized that this chapter has absolutely no dialogue in it (memory dialogue notwithstanding). I have _never_ written a dialogue-less chapter before. Weird...  
**


	14. Trapped

**A/N: This chapter is dedicated to Aleria14, because she left me a really nice review for the last chapter, and because I promised her that I would get this chapter up quickly.**

**But that doesn't mean that I don't love the rest of my reviewers, because I do. Muchly. =)  
**

* * *

**83**

The cell was dark. Apparently Jeb hadn't thought that they merited light, or any sort of comfort. In fact, Professor Henry was rather doubtful that they were even going to be fed. In the eyes of the School, they were traitors of the worst kind, a.k.a. they were screwed. The professor knew that their chances of escape were worse than slim.

He only wished that they'd been put in the same cell as the half of the flock that wasn't still deep in their daydreams.

"Thinking about what a mess we've made?" Doctor Jones asked, his voice sounding eerily disembodied in the darkness.

Professor Henry sighed. "Something like that, yeah."

"Do you think the flock's going to be okay?" Doctor Jones asked.

"Do you want me to say yes, or do you want the truth?"

"I know, stupid question," the doctor said. "How did we get ourselves into such a mess?"

"We made the dire mistake of letting our human hearts care about what happened to our fellow life forms," the professor said, rubbing his hands over his face. "Now we pay the price for not being diabolical fiends like the rest of the people in this place."

"At least we went out doing something good, right?" Doctor Jones said, sounding tired. "That's more than some people can say."

Professor Henry heard the resignation in the doctor's voice, and realized that they both knew they were going to die. The Director didn't leave traitors alive. She didn't even always leave perfectly good employees alive. There would definitely be no mercy for the two Whitecoats who had tried to help the flock, and surprisingly, the professor was okay with that.

He knew he wouldn't beg for his life when the time came.

* * *

**84**

Dr. Martinez looked up in alarm when I stumbled through the back door and nearly collapsed on the floor.

"Max!" she exclaimed. "Are you okay?"

"Do I _look_ okay?" I snarled, letting all of my frustration and anger about my situation out in my voice.

She looked taken aback. "I'm sorry. I know it was a silly question." She paused. "Is there anything I can do?"

"You can stay away from me," I said, and staggered my way to the living room.

She followed me. "Max, what's wrong? Why are you acting like this?"

I whirled around. "I said, stay away."

I knew the way I was acting was wrong. I knew it was irrational and unpleasant. Somehow, though, it seemed preferable to acting like everything was okay. Like I hadn't just discovered that the life I had been living for the past month wasn't really the paradise I'd thought it was.

"Okay, why don't you just sit down," Dr. M said, her mouth set in a grim line. "Try to calm down, and tell me what's wrong. I can't help if you won't let me."

"I don't want your help!" I shouted. "Leave. Me. _Alone_!" Tears pricked the corners of my eyes, but I didn't let them escape. My world was falling apart. The last thing I wanted to do was cry about it.

"What's going on?"

I turned toward the new voice, and saw Fang standing in the doorway to the living room. He looked concerned, most likely because I was standing in the middle of the living room with twigs in my hair and scratches all over me, yelling at someone who had been as kind and loving of a mother figure as we could have ever hoped for.

"Max just came back from her flight," Dr. Martinez explained, not taking her eyes off of me, "looking like this and acting rather oddly. She won't tell me what's wrong, but I'm fairly certain that she's in pain."

Just the mention of pain brought a fresh wave of it into my head, and I let out a yell. Clutching my head and trying to control it, I sank onto the couch.

"Go away," I moaned. "You're not real."

And then Fang was in front of me, crouching down to look me in the eye. "Max," he said gently, "what are you talking about? What happened to you?"

I shook my head, though what I was denying was unknown even to me. "You're not real," I repeated, aware that I was acting like a lunatic. "None of you. None of _this_."

"We're real," he said. "You know that. Here." He took my hand. "I feel real, don't I?"

I squeezed his hand. He felt solid, of course. I would have noticed it long before now if he wasn't. Looking at him, though, I almost allowed myself to believe that I was just going crazy, that maybe all of this was real. Why shouldn't I be able to live a happy, normal life?

Then I was back in the lab, and the feeling of realness settled over me again. _This_ was reality. I knew it, even more than I had the last time.

Snapping back to Dr. Martinez's living room, I pulled my hand out of Fang's and stood up abruptly.

"No," I said. "I know what's going on here, and I want out." I looked up at the ceiling, directing my next words to the heavens. "Do you hear me? I want out! Quit messing with me. You think it's funny, do you? Giving me what I want, just to rip it away again? Well, I'm not laughing!"

Dr. Martinez looked a little scared. "Max, who are you talking to? What are you even talking about?"

I ignored her, continuing to rant at the ceiling. "I don't care what you're doing. Just turn it off. Torture me or imprison me or whatever, I don't care, but stop doing this! I will _not_ live my entire life like this, you hear me? I won't!" I took a deep breath, then shouted as loud as I could. "LET ME OUT!"

Nothing happened.

Had I really expected anything? It's not like the scientists in the School were going to listen to me. That would have been ridiculous. "Hey, Joe, the victim is complaining that the torture is painful. I think we should stop." Yeah, right.

I sighed, and sank back down onto the couch. Was I going to have to live the rest of my life here, knowing that none of it was real? I needed the real flock to be here, to do what they really would have done, not what a couple of scientists thought they might do. I needed the real Fang to give me that little half-smile of his and tell me that I was being stupid. I needed the real Iggy to grin at me and tell me that he and Gazzy had blown up my entire wardrobe on accident. I needed the real Nudge to blather on endlessly about something completely unimportant. I needed the real Angel to smile sweetly up at me and ask for a pet pony or some such. Fakes just weren't going to cut it.

I _knew_ this wasn't real, so how could I live it?

And then the living room started to fade. It wasn't like when I'd had the flashes of the lab. Those had been sudden and accompanied by intense pain. This was slow, bringing on a slight foggy feeling, and all I was seeing creeping into my vision was black.

_Great,_ I thought bitterly. _I do believe I'm fainting._

I was right.

* * *

**A/N: Dun dun dun…And I feel like I've said that recently. Did I do that in my last AN? Am I a repetitive person? Yikes!**

**Review anyway?  
**


	15. Snapple

**A/N: Hey, people. Don't really have anything to say here, so...Happy reading!  
**

* * *

**85**

I blinked slowly, letting my eyes adjust to the bright light that seemed to be coming from all around me. The room around me came into focus, and I realized that I was in the lab. Somehow, I had gotten myself out of my lovely little La La Land.

I sat up. The room was empty. There was no Jeb anywhere to be found. Had I hallucinated him into my hallucination?

Oh, yes, that sounded sane.

I shook my head a little, trying to clear it. If I hadn't been certain that this was the School before, I was now. Glancing around, I realized that the bed I was strapped to wasn't the only one in the room. There were four others, two of which were empty, and two of which held…Fang and Iggy. Why did it feel like I hadn't seen them in weeks? Technically, I guess I hadn't.

I moved my hands around a little. To my surprise, I found that the straps were loose. Very loose, actually. It seemed rather unlike the School to leave any chance of us getting out, but hey, I wasn't about to complain. I wiggled my arms out of their restraints, then leaned down to undo the ones holding my ankles. Smiling in satisfaction, I swung my legs around and hopped off the bed.

Now what? I took in the room, inch by inch, scanning everything. Nothing seemed immediately dangerous, so I made my way over to where Fang and Iggy lay. They both looked like they were sleeping, but when I touched Fang's arm gently, he didn't move. With our survival instincts, that should have woken him up immediately. So they were under, probably like I had been up until a few minutes ago.

I had no idea how to get them out. Damn it.

Then I remembered the empty beds. _Nudge and Gazzy,_ I thought. _They must have gotten out somehow._ But how?

Thinking hard, I tried to come up with options. I needed _some_ sort of plan.

1. Stay here and putter around to see if I could wake either of the guys up. Risks: Whitecoat coming in to check on us.

2. Leave the room and wander around the halls of the School looking for the rest of the flock and/or a way out. Risks: Lots of Whitecoats in the halls.

3. Lay back down and pretend to be dreaming until something came of it. Risks: Well, less than the others.

The second option was risky. The first was a little less risky. The third was even less so, but had the downfall of complete inaction, which tends to not really suit my personality. So what did I do?

I did what I always do; I dove headfirst into the riskiest plan.

* * *

**86**

When the door opened, Professor Henry thought that his eyes might burst from the sudden onslaught of light.

"The Director wants to talk to you," a voice barked from the doorway. "Best get moving."

The professor stood up and stumbled his way to the door, his eyes adjusting far too slowly for his tastes. As soon as he had made it, a strong hand gripped his upper arm, and the voice said, "Cuff 'em quick. If they escape, it's on all of our heads."

"What are you afraid I'm going to do?" the professor asked wearily. "Think you to death? I'm a professor, not a soldier."

"We're not taking any chances here," the voice, which seemed to belong to a large, beefed-up security guard, said. "You know how the Director can get, I'm sure."

Yes, the professor certainly knew. He didn't hold it against either of the other men as they cuffed him and marched him down the halls. Nothing was worth getting the Director angry.

"It was nice knowing you, Professor," Doctor Jones said quietly. "You're a good man, to do what you did."

"That's kind of you," Professor Henry replied, "and ditto."

"Well, I'm glad you're both at peace with it all," the security guard said, "because I don't think you've got much longer to make it up."

* * *

**87**

I made my way cautiously through hall after hall. Luck must have been on my side, because I didn't see anyone. The place seemed deserted.

I was just starting to entertain thoughts of the School having been evacuated and all the Whitecoats being gone when I heard voices ahead of me. After a moment of listening, I decided that they were heading my way. I dodged into a small hallway that seemed to lead to a janitor's closet and waited.

About a minute later, they passed me. It seemed to be the same sort of thugs that had knocked us all out a month earlier, leading…two Whitecoats in handcuffs? I frowned. Huh?

I supposed that it could have been some weird ritual that all the creepy scientists did where they sacrificed two of their own for the greater good, but to me, it seemed more like those two Whitecoats had done something wrong. And you know what? Anyone who did something wrong by the School's rules probably had the potential to be a useful ally. Besides, if they did turn out to be evil, I could just punch 'em around a bit and send them back.

Looked like I was rushing headlong into another risky plan, then.

It was a good thing that the guards didn't seem to think that two a scientist could overpower one of them, because it meant there were only two guards for me to worry about. I crept out of my hiding place and up behind the rear guard. Knowing that what I was doing had been done in too many ninja movies to count, I put my hand over his mouth and used a half-empty bottle of Snapple that I'd found on the janitor cart to quickly knock him unconscious.

I grinned. Just call me the Queen of Weapon Improvisation.

Of course, the security guard did make a bit of noise when he hit the floor, so I now had the attention of the guard at the front. He whipped around, and spent a couple seconds just staring at me in surprise. Unfortunately for him, they were seconds that he really shouldn't have wasted. I darted up and punched him straight in the solar plexus, then used the Snapple to knock him out too.

I turned around to find the two Whitecoats staring at me in shock.

"Max?" one of them said. "How did you get out?"

I frowned at him. "Okay, you seem to know me, but…Do I know you?"

"Oh, right," he said. "I feel like I know you so well, it's kind of strange that we haven't actually met yet." He held his hand out. "I'm Professor Henry. I work here."

I didn't take his hand. "Yeah, I figured that out by the coat. Why do you know me, exactly?"

"I'm on of the ones they had working on your paradise, for lack of a better word." He gestured to the man next to him. "This is Doctor Jones. He was the other one they had on it."

I narrowed my eyes suspiciously. "You're the ones in charge of our prisons, are you? Maybe I should have left you in the care of the guards."

"No, Max, you don't understand," Doctor Jones said hurriedly. "We've been trying to get you out for the last two weeks. We managed to free Nudge and Gazzy, but they caught us and locked us up. I think we were just being to taken to be executed, actually."

"Interesting," I said, mulling it over. I supposed it could be true. Or Gazzy and Nudge could have been taken off and tortured and these two were just trying to keep me from killing them. "Suppose I say I believe you; how would you propose freeing the rest of my flock?"

Professor Henry scratched his neck. "Well, we were working on that. We had Angel go into the others' fantasies using her mind-reading powers and tell them what was going on. That's how we got Gazzy and Nudge out. We tried it on Iggy, but he resisted. We were caught before we could get to you or Fang. As for how to get Gazzy, Nudge, and Angel out of where they've been imprisoned…I don't know. It's not really my area of expertise."

"Okay, two things," I said. "One, Angel thinks she's two years old."

"We fixed that," Doctor Jones said. "She's been completely cured."

I nodded slowly. "Okay. Two, what do you mean, Iggy resisted?"

"Ah, well…" The doctor looked slightly uncomfortable. "He refused to leave his fantasy, even once he knew what was going on. We think he believed Angel, but was too happy to make himself want to leave."

He _what_? Then I remembered how he'd been acting when we'd been locked up before. He'd seemed really depressed and distant. Maybe he thought the dream was the perfect escape from life.

"Just out of curiosity," I said slowly, "what exactly _is_ his paradise?"

Professor Henry sighed. "He has his sight back."

That was all he needed to say. I knew that if there was anything in the world that Iggy would give up his freedom for, it was his sight.

"Great," I said. "There's no way we're getting him out." I ran my hands through my hair, thinking. "Okay, so the rest of the flock first. If we can get Fang out, he can help us free Gazzy, Nudge, and Angel."

"We can't get Fang out without Angel's help," Professor Henry said. "If we just unplug him then, one, he'll be extremely disoriented, and two, it'll sound alarms that will bring half the School running."

"Oh." I groaned. "How the hell are we going to do this, then?"

"We have to get the younger ones out first," Doctor Jones said, making the whole thing sound much simpler than it was. Then he looked at me, his expression puzzled. "Why do you have a Snapple?"

Startled, I glanced down at the peach tea that I still held. "Oh. I found it on a janitor's cart and used it to knock the guards out." I shrugged and took a swig. "Still tastes fine."

Nothing like the power of Snapple.

* * *

**A/N: Yes, that was really random. Yes, it was only in there because I was drinking a Snapple when I wrote it. A lemon one, unfortunately. The dumb store didn't have any peach. =(**

**I hate to say this, but I'm kinda stuck on the next chapter. I've only got part of it written, and I'm not even completely happy with that. So please excuse me if it's a little while before it comes out. I'll try to get it done soon-ish, though, I promise.  
**


	16. Shock

**A/N: A million and one thank yous to AmyQueen95. I could never have gotten over my writer's block this quickly without her help, and the story would certainly have gone in a much less interesting direction. This chapter's for her, because I love making people feel smiley inside. =)**

* * *

**88**

In the end, we decided to split up. The professor told me where I could find the cells that were most likely holding the flock's younger set, and I headed off to see if there was any way I could break them out. The doctor and the professor were going back to the lab where I'd woken up to see if they could find a way around the alarm system that stopped us from getting Iggy and Fang out. I could only hope that they weren't going to turn me in.

I continued down the hall, heading in the direction that Professor Henry, Doctor Jones, and their lovely escorts had come from. It seemed to go on forever, but that may have just been because I was terrified that I was going to run into some sort of patrol and just get thrown into the cell with the others instead of getting them out.

Finally, I made it to the cell block. I cautiously stuck my head around the corner, then immediately withdrew it. There must have been at least twenty guards! Were they really _that_ worried about rescue attempts and break-outs?

I bit my lip, thinking hard. I couldn't just dive in recklessly, not this time. There were far too many guards there for me and my Snapple to handle alone. I needed backup, and lots of it, though honestly, I didn't even know if my entire flock would be able to handle this one. I knew from prior experience that these guys were nasty. Ten of them had taken out my entire flock, minus Angel. Twenty of them? We'd be road kill. Just me? I wasn't really sure that I even wanted to try to picture what _that_ would look like.

As much as it completely killed my infallible pride, I was going to have to go get help, and there were only two people that I could go to.

Sighing, I turned and headed back up to the lab.

* * *

**89**

Professor Henry groaned and dropped his face into his hands. They had tried every trick they knew, and they still couldn't get past the security system that the School installed into all of their important programs. Some genius computer nerd had put it together, and it was far above both the professor's and the doctor's level of computer knowledge to deactivate it.

"This is hopeless," Doctor Jones said, nicely expressing the professor's own feelings on the matter. "We just don't know enough."

"Apparently not," Professor Henry agreed.

They were both silent for a few minutes.

"I hate to say this," the doctor said, "but we may as well give up and put our significant brain power to a use that it might better understand."

"I take it you're not feeling particularly humble today," the professor replied, but then shrugged. "That's not to say you aren't right, though. There are much more productive things we could be doing for the flock."

"How about finding a way past the twenty-plus guards that happen to be guarding the cell block?" a female voice asked. They both looked up as Max stalked into the room and stopped in front of the desk they were working at, arms crossed. "There is absolutely no way I can take them all out on my own."

"Ah," Professor Henry said, scratching his head. "I didn't realize that they kept it that well guarded. That could be a problem."

"You think?" Max said. "Are you sure there's absolutely no way to get Fang out? Together we'd have twice the chance of managing it. He's pretty decent when it comes to thinking, too."

Doctor Jones sighed. "Not without setting of the alarms, no. I'm sorry."

Professor Henry was about to agree when something occurred to him. It was a bit strange and off-the-wall, not to mention completely untested, but it was better than the nothing that they currently had.

Max seemed to notice his thoughtful expression, because she immediately said, "What have you got?"

"Well," he said slowly, "I don't know if you'll want to try it, but I think I may have an idea."

"I'd do almost anything, at this point," Max said. "Hit me."

Professor Henry nodded. "Okay. Just so you know ahead of time, though, it would involve you being hooked up to the machine again."

Max's expression immediately became guarded. "Oh. I see."

Knowing that there was nothing he could say to make her trust him, the professor stuck with something that he knew she would respond to.

"Look at it this way," he said. "If we put you under just to turn you back over to the Director, how is that really worse than being stuck here with none of your flock and no way to escape?" He paused. "But if it's any consolation, I swear that we're trying to help you."

Max still looked a bit suspicious (naturally), but she nodded. "Alright. Say I believe you. What's your plan?"

"I think that we can hook you back up," he explained, "but instead of putting you back into your own paradise, we can insert you into Fang's. Then you'll be able to talk to him, convince him that it's not real, et cetera. These machines were technically made for only one consciousness at a time, but I'm fairly certain we could make it work."

She was silent for a while. Then she finally said, "Okay. Let's try it."

* * *

**90**

I couldn't believe I was doing this.

Yes, I was doing it for the good of the flock. Yes, I was doing it so that maybe I could have a chance at a free life. Yes, I was doing it for Fang.

No, I still couldn't believe that I had actually agreed to it. I mean, two scientists that I wasn't completely sure I could trust were going to hook me up to a machine when they were only "fairly certain" that it would work. Was I insane? Well, yes, but not usually in this way. Generally I was insane in a less trusting, more emotionally unstable, hearing-voices-in-my-head sort of way. Though now that I thought about it, the Voice was probably just another thing made up by the School for our little real-world test drive. That was actually kind of comforting.

"So, what exactly am I supposed to do?" I asked, watching them disconnect and reconnect wires from my perch on the bed and fighting down the urge to fidget or hurl or possibly run away screaming. "I just…talk to him?"

Professor Henry nodded distractedly. "Just get him to believe you about what's going on. You've known him long enough that you can probably manage that m-…Damn it!" He pulled away from the tangle of wires he'd been fiddling with, holding his hand. "Tell me again why we can't just turn the power off like you're supposed to when working with electronics?"

"Because it would cut the power to Fang's unit and be just as bad as turning it off," Doctor Jones replied around the wrench that he held in between his teeth. He removed the wrench and looked up at the professor. "You know, there _are_ rubber gloves in the closet."

"Those things just make you clumsy," the professor muttered, crouching back down to work with the wires again.

Finally giving in to my need to move, I hopped off the bed and began pacing.

"Okay," I said, "so what if he _doesn't_ believe me? Then what?"

"I don't know," Professor Henry replied. "Just make sure he does."

I scowled. "Brilliant."

"Max." The professor sighed and looked up at me. "I've seen what you can do. I've been here for most of your life, after all. I know you've got this in you." He smiled faintly. "He'll believe you."

For some reason, despite the fact that I had absolutely no proof that these two white coated men weren't trying to turn me in, the professor's assurance actually made me feel a bit better. I rolled my shoulders a couple times and nodded to myself. "Right. I can do this."

Professor Henry just shook his head, still smiling, and went back to work.

Ten minutes later, I was lying back on the bed, preparing to put my well-being into the hands of two people that I'd known for about forty-five minutes. I tried not to think about that, though. I laid my head back on the somewhat inadequate pillow and took several deep breaths. _Don't freak out, Max. It'll be okay…hopefully._

Yep. Very consoling.

"Alright, Max," I heard the doctor say. "Everything's all set. Are you ready?"

_Don't freak out, don't freak out…_

Another deep breath. "Sure. Go for it."

One press of a button later, I was right back where I'd been barely an hour before: unconscious.

* * *

**A/N: I'm not going to say much here, because I'm trying to rewatch How To Train Your Dragon at the moment, and as it's an amazingly epic movie, I'd like to focus on that. =)**

**Review, though, please.  
**


	17. Convincing

**A/N: I think I'm actually managing an update a week. I'm a little surprised with myself, honestly. I hope you all appreciate it. =P  
**

* * *

**91**

"Okay, so say I _do_ believe you," Fang said, frowning. "What would that mean, exactly?"

Max looked uncertain. "I don't exactly know. This has never happened before."

"That much is obvious," Fang replied. He sighed. "Alright, let's go. I suppose I can try."

Max smiled. "Thanks, Fang." She grabbed his hand and turned, heading back toward the center of the island. After a few minutes, she said, "I don't know why they weren't listening to me. It's like I'm not the leader anymore or something. I think paradise is making them soft."

He shrugged. "You didn't expect that?"

Max didn't reply. They arrived in the clearing where the flock had set up camp, and the rest of the flock was nowhere in sight.

"Great!" she exclaimed. "They've run out on me!" She turned to Fang. "Now what?"

He thought for a moment, and had just opened his mouth to reply, but he never got the chance.

Another Max popped into existence in the center of the clearing.

Fang's eyes widened, and he stared from one Max to the other in shock. What the hell was going on? This was _definitely_ not normal.

"Fang?" asked the Max that hadn't just appeared. She was facing him, and couldn't see the other Max coming up behind her. "What's wrong?"

"Um…" He couldn't get past that. This was just too weird.

Then he noticed that the other Max seemed to be speaking…except he couldn't hear her. She seemed to notice this at the same time he did, and closed her mouth abruptly, frowning. Her mouth opened again, then closed, and she touched her throat. Then her expression turned to one of annoyance.

"…going to _kill_ those Whitecoats," she said, and her expression smoothed. "Oh. There we go."

The Max who had still been looking at Fang spun around, her jaw dropping. "Who are _you_?"

The other Max smirked at her. "I'm you," she said, "only real."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Fang asked, finally finding his voice again. "Are you saying we're _not_ real?"

"No," Other Max said, "I'm not. I'm saying that _she's_ not real. You certainly are."

That only made the whole thing more confusing. "How can I be real if she isn't? And what does 'real' even mean?" _It doesn't even sound like a word anymore…_

Other Max sighed. "This is a bad place to start."

"I'd say," Max said. She turned to Fang. "My vote is for clone. You?"

"I'm not a clone," Other Max said indignantly. "I'm Maximum Ride. You should be able to tell…I haven't offered to cook breakfast yet."

Fang smiled a little at the memory Other Max's words brought up. "Either the School has seriously hiked up their surveillance of us, or she's just as much Max as you are."

Max huffed. "But she can't be. I'm standing right here!"

"So is she," he pointed out. He paused, turning to Other Max. "You're not going to tell us you've traveled back in time to warn us of the apocalypse, are you?"

Other Max frowned. "Do I _look_ that old? I'm the same age you are."

"So what's your explanation for this one?" he asked. "It's got to be pretty out-there."

Max stepped between them, facing Fang. "You can't be telling me that you _believe_ her, can you? Did the last month mean nothing to you?"

Fang raised his eyebrows at her. "Of course not, but why would that change my opinion on this?"

"Because I'm obviously the real Max!" she exclaimed. "She's some sort of clone, I'm sure of it."

"Am not," Other Max said grouchily, crossing her arms. She stepped forward to stand next to Max.

Fang looked between them. "This is insane."

"A bit, yeah," Other Max agreed. "Goes well with the state of your mind, doesn't it?"

He rolled his eyes. "Ditto."

"Stop it, Fang!" Max demanded. "Stop talking to her like that. _I'm_ the real Max here."

"You know, Max," he said, "you've been a bit off ever since the cave. I'm starting to think that something a little weird is going on."

"Off?" Max repeated. "What does that mean? I'm not allowed to act different? I think that being in a relationship is allowed to change people, Fang!"

Then, as if to prove her point, she kissed him.

What was it with girls, anyway?

* * *

**92**

As I watched the simulation's Max kiss Fang, I felt a mass of conflicting emotions rise to the surface. The main one was disbelief; Fang's paradise had _that_ in it? How was that supposed to make me feel? Another was incredulity at Other Max's complete lack of tact or timing. I suppose you can only get so much from a computer program. And the rest I decided to ignore, since they included things like a vague jealousy that I would never admit to.

"You done yet?" I asked, trying to sound as uninterested as possible.

Other Max pulled away from Fang and turned to glare at me. "Who _are_ you? And I want the real answer this time."

This was so annoying. Who knew that my biggest problem with getting Fang out was going to be myself?

"Okay, fine," I said. "Real answer. I'm the _real_ Max." When Other Max's glare grew even angrier, I continued, "Yes, that's the truth. This…" I gestured to the jungle island around us. "…is all a simulation. Some sort of computer program. Fang, did you have a dream, about a month ago? A dream of the School capturing us and telling us that our lives had just been a dream? A test of our capability to live in the real world?"

A flicker of surprise lit in Fang's eyes, and he nodded.

"So did I," I said, "only that wasn't the dream. This is. That was actually our one taste of the real world in between two programmed lives that we've spent hooked up to a machine in the School. Only last time, we were all together. This time, they split us up and gave us each a sort of paradise."

Fang looked between me and Other Max again. "I…don't really know what to think of this."

"Don't believe her, Fang!" Other Max said. "You've got to know that I'm the real one. In your heart, if not with your eyes."

Okay, she was really getting on my nerves. If I had ever acted like this, just shoot me now. The computers really thought that this was going to fool Fang?

Only it had. For an entire month. I wondered briefly what Fang would have thought of the version of himself that had been in my paradise. How well did we _really_ know each other, if this could work on us?

Fang had closed his eyes, breathing deeply. "Have I mentioned that this is insane?"

"Um, yeah," I said. "You know, the sooner you make up your mind, the sooner we can get out of here and go rescue the rest of the flock."

His eyes snapped open. "Why? What happened to them?"

"She's just messing with you," Other Max said. "Don't listen to her."

I ignored her. "They got out, with the help of a couple Whitecoats who are apparently on our side. Then they got captured again, and they're being held in a cell that's guarded by about twenty of the oafs that knocked us out a month ago to take us to the lab where they hooked us up to this. I can't get them out by myself, even with a Snapple."

He frowned at the last bit. "Snapple?"

I waved my hand. "Never mind. The point is that every moment we sit here arguing is another moment they're stuck in there, and the more of a chance there is that someone will walk into the lab and catch us all out. Then we'll be in there with them, and there will be very little chance of us ever getting out."

"That doesn't really sound good," Fang agreed. "What if I did believe you? How would you get me out?"

"Fang!" Other Max yelled. "What are you _thinking_?"

He rounded on her. "I'm thinking that she's acting more like the Max I know than you ever have, and what she's saying is making a surprising amount of sense."

I smiled. Just the way he said it proved that he was already thinking of my story as the truth. Otherwise, he would still be thinking of her as the Max he'd known all his life, and the first part of his sentence would have made no sense.

This was actually working.

Other Max was nearly in tears, yet another sign that she was definitely not me. "You're really going to listen to her?"

He ignored her. (_Yes!_) "Max, answer the question: How do you plan to get me out of here?"

I grinned. "It's all you, Fang. All you have to do is believe _completely_ that this world isn't real. Once you've got yourself entirely convinced, you'll get out all by yourself." I smirked at Other Max. "Doesn't sound so much like I'm trying to capture him, does it?"

She just glared at me again.

"That's it?" Fang asked disbelievingly. "I just…convince myself?"

"Yep," I said. "It's harder than it sounds, though. For me, it took extreme headaches, hallucinations of the School, and about an hour to manage it." I paused. "Course, I didn't have anyone there telling me what was going on. That might have helped."

Other Max stepped up to me, arms crossed. "I'm not letting you take him," she declared. "He's staying with me."

I raised my eyebrows. "And just how do you plan to stop him from leaving?"

Other Max's eyes narrowed, and she smiled menacingly. It was honestly the first expression to come from her that I could have pictured on myself. "If you're gone, he won't have any reason to leave, will he?"

"Twisted logic, much?" I asked, but the look in her eyes was enough to make me back up a few steps. She had every intention of attacking me. I looked up at the jungle canopy. "Um, Professor? If I die here, do I die out there too?"

A moment later, a flock of small birds flew into the clearing, formed the word YES, and flew back out again.

I sighed. "Great."

Fang was staring up at the place where the birds had been, his eyes wide. "I think I'm convinced."

Other Max waved her hand dismissively. "Coincidence."

Now Fang was staring at her. "Really convinced," he said dryly. "Let's go, Max."

Other Max advanced on me, and I backed up again. "It's all you, Fang," I called over her shoulder. "But please do it before your homicidal girlfriend kills me. Being murdered by myself is not at the top of my list of ways to die."

"You have a list?" he called back, but when I glared at him around Other Max, he quickly saluted. "Sorry, ma'am. I'll get right on that."

"You're going to pay for this," Other Max growled at me, and then she jumped at me.

I ducked quickly, avoiding her fist. She seemed rather slow and clumsy, and I figured that she hadn't really been programmed to fight. This was supposed to be a paradise, after all. Staying in my crouch, I swung my right leg under her legs, toppling her.

"I really don't think I am," I replied, grinning. I stood up and raised my fist to clock her good, but then I noticed a shadow fall across us. Glancing up, I saw that Fang was now hovering above us, his black wings beating slowly, his eyes closed. Interesting…

Other Max took my momentary distraction as a chance to kick me hard in the shin.

"Ow!" I yelled, then glared at her. "That is a low and immature fighting technique."

She shrugged. "Hey, if it works…"

I punched her hard in the nose.

"That's also low and immature," I said sweetly, "but hey, if it works…"

Her constantly present glare intensified, and she came at me again, blood dripping from her nose. "I'm going to kill y-"

"Will you two shut up?" Fang interrupted her loudly.

We both did, surprisingly. A few moments later, the entire scene faded away.

It had worked.

* * *

**A/N: So I just spent ten minutes staring at the screen trying to come up with an AN, and therefore decided it didn't really need one. Review?  
**


	18. Rescue

**A/N: Happy Halloween, peoples! Well, tomorrow's Halloween, but I thought I could say it now without too much trouble. I am going to a H'ween party today, after all. =)  
**

* * *

**93**

As soon as my eyes opened, I was off my bed and running over to Fang's. To my relief, he was looking around groggily.

"It worked, then?" he asked. "I got us out?"

I nodded. "Yeah. Nice going." I paused, then added, "What was with the hovering thing?"

He shrugged. "I figured it would be easier to make myself not believe in that world if I couldn't feel it."

"Neat," I said, grinning. Then my smile faded. "We have to get the flock out."

"And on that account," said Professor Henry, striding over to us, "we may have a solution." He held a small, boxy contraption out to me. "We think that this will deactivate the cell block's locks, if you can get it to the key pad without getting captured or killed."

I took it from him, holding it up to examine it. "It's kind of puny," I said. "You sure it'll work?"

"Fairly sure, yes," he replied. "If it doesn't, well…I'm guessing you won't be around to care, because the alarm that it'll set off will bring most of the School running."

"How very uplifting," Fang said, swinging his legs over the side of his bed. He glanced around, and noticed Iggy. "Don't we have to get him out first?"

I sighed. "Apparently Angel already tried. He was too happy. He wouldn't leave his paradise. We just have to hope that we can unplug him later and still make it out."

"Brilliant," Fang muttered. "Just what we need."

"You two should go," Doctor Jones said. "Any minute now, someone could decide to come check on the three of you that are still supposed to be asleep, and our entire plan will be compromised."

I nodded, squaring my shoulders. "So we just stick this little box on the keypad?"

"Yes," the professor confirmed. "The top of the keypad, over the screen. Then press the black button on the side of the box."

I turned the box over, locating the button. "Gotcha. Sounds fairly simple."

"That part is," Doctor Jones said. "It's getting to the keypad that's going to difficult."

* * *

**94**

We retraced my earlier steps, this time not encountering any Whitecoats being escorted by security guards. We didn't encounter anyone, actually. The first time, I'd found it mildly strange. This time it was downright unnerving.

"Where is everyone?" I wondered aloud. "The School can't be completely deserted, can it?"

Fang shrugged. "Better for us."

"I guess," I agreed. "It kinda feels like they're all grouped up in a conference to plan our dramatic demise, though."

He just gave me an amused glance, and I dropped the subject.

After a few more minutes, I gradually became aware of the fact that Fang kept looking at me, an odd expression on his face. Finally, I looked right back at him.

"Is there a reason you're doing that?" I asked snippily. "It's really kind of annoying."

He frowned. "Sorry. Just…thinking."

"Right." I stopped and held a hand out in front of him. "We're almost there," I said. "It'd be best if we both shut up now."

He nodded, and we continued forward, making our best attempts to be completely silent. Fang, with his years of practice, did a little better at that than I did. One of these days I was going to have to ask him how he managed that. Maybe he could give me lessons.

I stopped again right before the corner. Lowering my voice to below the average human's level of hearing, I said, "It's right around there. There are about twenty guards guarding the cells."

He poked his head around the corner. After a moment, to my horror, he stepped forward, directly into their line of sight.

"Really?" he asked, his voice normal. "I don't see anyone."

Frowning, I stuck my head out.

He was right. There was no one there.

"This is weird," I announced, staring at the cell doors in confusion. "Why would they leave it unguarded?"

"Maybe they underestimated us again," Fang said. "They've done it before."

"Not really," I countered. "Only in a dream where they meant to let us escape. I don't like this. It feels like a trap."

He shrugged. "Won't argue with you there."

I took a few tentative steps forward. Nothing jumped out at me, no alarms suddenly started blaring. I cautiously made my way over to the keypad. It was a gray box with rubber number keys and a small green screen, and looked to be just the right shape for the professor's little box to fit over.

"Here goes nothing," I said, and stuck the box on the screen.

Nothing happened.

Fang sighed. "You have to press the button, Max."

"I would've figured that out," I said, pressing the button.

There was a small beep. The light on the side of the keypad turned green, and the cell block doors sprang open.

"Somehow," I said, "this seems too easy."

* * *

**95**

"So we're all in agreement?" the Director asked the room-at-large. The assembled pumped-up security guards, sociopathic scientists, and wolf-hybrid mutants all nodded. "Excellent. Get moving."

Once everyone else had left, Jeb approached the Director. "You're certain this will work?"

If it had been anyone but Jeb, the Director would have had them executed for daring to question her judgment. But since it was Jeb, she let it slide.

"Of course," she replied. "They're missing one of their strongest fighters. They're vulnerable, and we're going to take complete advantage of that."

"I know," Jeb said. "It just seems like…not enough."

"Not enough?" the Director asked. "How much force do _you_ think we need?" She didn't stop to let him answer. "I believe that I have employed just enough. After all, overkill is usually unnecessary."

He inclined his head. "Forgive my impertinence. You're right, of course. You generally are."

"And I believe that is why I am the head of this operation and you are not." She waved her hand toward the door. "Go make yourself useful. I have work to do."

He nodded, quickly making himself scarce.

The Director sat down at her computer and opened her To-Do List document. She typed in a checkmark next to "Organize debilitation of mutants".

Next up…"Make the mutants wish they'd never even thought of trying to escape".

* * *

**96**

I popped the box off of the keypad and stuck it back in my pocket. "Let's go get the rest of the flock."

Fang headed toward the first cell, and I followed closely behind him. We passed the first cell, then the second cell, then the third.

"Where are they?" I whispered. "They have to be here somewhere."

He didn't answer, just kept moving forward, checking each cell as we passed it. Ten cells in, I was starting to get worried. Had the Whitecoats betrayed us after all? Was there some sort of ambush waiting for us at the end of this hallway? Was the rest of the flock–

"There they are," Fang said quietly, stopping at cell number fourteen.

And there they were. My flock, blinking rapidly at the sudden light and squinting up at us.

"Max?" Angel asked. "Fang? How did you get out?"

"Got ourselves out," I said, crouching down in front of her. "I heard you were quite the little hero earlier."

"Heroine," she corrected.

I grinned at her. "Sorry. Heroine."

"Max," Fang said, his tone a bit too calm, "we need to leave."

I looked up to where he was still standing in the doorway. "Now?"

"Oh, yeah." He was staring intently back down the hall. "Now would be great."

I stood up and went to stand next to him. "What is it?"

"I'm not sure," he said. "It sounds bad, though."

I immediately stopped and listened. After a moment, I noticed a far-off sound of many booted feet. My eyes widened, and I looked at Fang in horror.

"They're coming this way, aren't they?"

He nodded mutely.

"Okay, guys," I said, not even attempting the calm tone that Fang had managed. "We're leaving."

They all knew when I meant business, and no one questioned why we were moving in such a hurry. If Fang and I said we needed to go, they went.

Have I mentioned that I love my flock?

We quickly made our way out of the cell, and headed in the opposite direction that we'd come. I didn't even know if this hall went anywhere other than the rest of the cells, but I guess we were going to find out. Why hadn't I asked the professor for escape routes or a floor plan? How could that have slipped my mind?

I guess I had to pay for a month of living the soft life.

"I think they're gaining on us," Fang told me quietly. "I don't suppose you've got a plan?"

"None whatsoever," I replied. "You?"

He shook his head. "We're screwed."

"That's very positive, Fang," I said sarcastically. "Now why don't you tell the rest of the flock that?"

He got my point. "We'll think of something, right?"

"We always do."

Unfortunately, the sound of feet behind us was steadily getting closer.

* * *

**A/N: You know how readers are never worried for the characters because the author must always have some sort of last minute escape ready? Well, I'll tell you now that I have no clue how they're getting out of this one. =/**

**Anyway, I wrote this chapter specifically for the purpose of letting everyone know that I won't be updating for a month. NaNoWriMo has come again, folks…and I think most of my readers are actually doing NaNo themselves and know exactly why I won't be updating. =P So…yeah.**

**And I just went back and looked at those two paragraphs and suddenly felt rather cruel. Oh dear…maybe I'll try to write another chapter in between all of the NaNo mayhem so that I don't have to leave everyone with a cliffie for a month. We'll see how things go. **

**A whole bunch of positive reviews just might make me try even harder to squeeze that extra chapter in. (hint hint) **


	19. Flight

**A/N: Yeah, this is me squeezing a spare chapter in between my very busy NaNoWriMo schedule for all my readers who are possibly so busy with their own NaNos that they won't even have time to read it. Oh well. At least I'll feel a little better that I didn't let it go an entire month. =)**

* * *

**97**

"How do you think they're doing?" Doctor Jones asked, not for the first time. "Oh, I feel dreadful about sending them in there. That was a bad idea."

Professor Henry actually agreed with the doctor, but he was trying very hard not to let the worry set in too badly. It would be much better for the flock if the two men did something useful while they were waiting, instead of chewing their fingernails down to the quick and asking questions that they knew couldn't be answered.

So instead of answering the doctor's unanswerable question, the professor just continued to type away at the computer. He may not be able to hack the security systems, as they were the most protected of all the programs, but he could get into the inventory and shipping systems quite easily.

"Okay," he said, "there's a truck showing up in an hour, and then another one a half hour after that. Which one do you think would be better?"

"Where are they going?" Doctor Jones asked.

The professor raised an eyebrow at him. "Does it matter? The important thing is just to get the flock out of the School. Past that, I don't really think they'll care where they end up."

"Okay, okay." The doctor frowned. "So the question is, do we want to give them extra time in case they aren't ready in an hour, or do we want to get them out of here sooner to avoid the extra time having the unpleasant side effect of attracting more guards?"

"That would be the main dilemma here," the professor agreed. "Unfortunately, we can't really estimate times when we don't know how well the rescue mission is going."

The doctor slumped down into the nearest chair. "This is hopeless."

"Not hopeless, no," the professor replied, staring undecidedly at the computer screen. "Just difficult. We have to make a decision, for the flock's sake."

Doctor Jones breathed in deeply. "Yes. You're right." He closed his eyes, and when he opened them again he looked determined. "Okay, let's go with the hour one. I have this nagging feeling that someone's going to come check the lab any minute, so the sooner we're out of here, the better, I think."

Professor Henry nodded and clicked on the button to edit the delivery's pick-up information. He found the place where it said who was scheduled to retrieve the goods from the truck, and deleted the current ones, replacing them with his own and the doctor's. He clicked 'Save', then leaned back in his chair.

"Alright," he announced, "it's done. We have to make sure we get down in there in plenty of time to pull this off."

"Maybe we should have told Max and Fang our plan before they left," the doctor mused. "I hope things don't get out of hand."

* * *

**98**

They were still gaining on us.

"Okay, Fang," I panted. "We have to do something _now_. These guys are fast."

"You already said that," he replied. "A few times, I think."

"Well, it's still true," I said, "so I'm still saying it."

That was when I glanced to the side and noticed all of the open doors that led straight into nice, dark little rooms. My eyes widening in realization, I screeched to a halt. Fang quickly noticed that I wasn't next to him anymore and stopped as well, and the rest of the flock nearly ran into our backs.

"Everybody in a cell," I said. "Let's get out of sight."

Fang raised his eyebrows. "Took you an awful long time to come up with 'get out of sight'."

I glared at him. "Yeah? Well, I didn't hear you saying." He opened his mouth, and I pointed into the cell. "In."

He rolled his eyes, but did as he was told. I followed him in and made to shut the door, but Angel stopped me.

"Don't," she said. "They'll notice if it's shut."

As this was coming from the girl who I would trust most to tell me accurate facts about psychology, I did as she suggested and left the door open. Unfortunately, this meant that we all had to squeeze into the corners on either side of the door so that no one would be able to look in and see us. Since we were the biggest, Fang and I took one corner while the other three crammed into the other side.

"Cozy," Fang muttered, and I smacked his arm.

"If you make the guards find us, I'll kill you," I warned him. "We have to be quiet, because I'm pretty sure that they have better hearing than your average security guards."

"You're the one doing all the talking," he replied.

Damn him, he was right. The guards would have been much more likely to hear my rambling than his one quiet word. Why did I get myself into these situations?

We all remained quiet as the boot steps stomped closer. The suspense was like something out of a horror movie, with us hiding there, just waiting for someone to stick their head in and say, "Gotcha!" We'd probably all scream like little girls if that happened. Well, maybe not Fang. It was extremely hard to picture Fang screaming.

To my immense relief, the guards didn't even pause as they passed the cell we were hiding in. They came…and then they went, their steps fading into the distance just as they had come.

I stepped out of my corner and cautiously stuck my head out the door. There was no one there.

"All clear," I announced quietly. "Let's go."

* * *

**99**

"What do you mean, they lost them?" the Director screeched. "They were chasing them down a hall, and they _lost them_? How is that possible?"

Jeb scratched his neck. "Honestly, I think they lost some of their intelligence when we gave them all that extra strength. They were chasing the experiments through the cell block, and all of the cells were open. Most likely, they managed to hide in one of the cells just far enough ahead of the guards you sent that the guards didn't notice that they weren't in front of them anymore."

"This is ridiculous," the Director said. "I want all of those cells searched."

"I highly doubt that they're still in there," Jeb said. "They probably left as soon as the guards had passed."

"I. Don't. CARE!" the Director shouted. "Search them anyway! Search the whole damn building! I want those experiments FOUND!"

"I understand," Jeb said hastily. "We'll find them."

The Director smiled at him, though it wasn't a nice smile. "That's a much better attitude. And while you're at it, check the lab where the experiments were being held in their dream states. Somebody broke the others out, and they're the first possible suspects." She frowned. "What happened to those two scientists that were waking them up before? I summoned them earlier, and I've just realized that they never arrived."

"Uh, I…I don't know," Jeb said, taking a step back toward the door. "I'll go try to find that out, why don't I."

He turned and fled out the door, leaving the Director to her shouting.

* * *

**100**

When we arrived back at the lab, both of the scientists immediately jumped up from where they'd been sitting, identical looks of relief on their faces.

"You did it," Professor Henry breathed. "Wonderful."

"Hi, Professor," Angel and Nudge both said at the same time. After sharing a small grin, they both continued, "Hi, Doctor."

"Cute," I told them. Then I turned to the professor. "Have you got any plans for Iggy yet?"

"Iggy?" Professor Henry shook his head. "Unfortunately not. But we do have a plan to get all of you out of the School. We all need to be down by the shipping dock in no more than forty-five minutes."

"The shipping dock?" Gazzy asked. "Are you mailing us out?"

Doctor Jones smiled. "Sort of. We're going to sneak you onto a truck when it comes to deliver its goods, and then it'll take you safely outside of the School's perimeters."

"Sounds like it might have a decent chance of succeeding," I said thoughtfully. Then I looked over at Iggy. "But what about him?"

Professor Henry followed my gaze. "Ah," he said sadly. "Well, I think our best bet is to just unplug him right before we leave and just carry him with us. I don't like the thought of having the alarm sounding, but I can't see any other option."

I thought for a moment, then shook my head. "We don't have to risk the alarm, Professor."

He frowned at me. "Why not?"

"I can go in," I said. "I did it for Fang, I can do it for Iggy too."

"The point is sort of that we already tried that," the professor said. "He doesn't want to leave. Also, that'll leave you completely defenseless, and currently that seems like a very bad idea."

"I think I can get him out," I insisted. "Just let me go in and try."

"No, Max," Fang said. "I agree with the professor. It's too dangerous for you to be unable to fight, especially with our situation right now."

"Hook me up," I growled, determined to make them let me. "If it comes to a fight, Iggy is really quite useful. It'd be better to have him with us than to have to carry him around like spare luggage."

"But there are so many things that can go wrong." Doctor Jones stepped into the argument. "Any moment, someone could walk in that door. We can't risk having you hooked up when that happens."

"I know that!" I yelled. "But I am _not_ leaving Iggy in that machine!"

"I'm not hooking you up, Max," Professor Henry replied. "You're worth more than the possibility of Iggy, I'm sorry."

"Damn it!" I brought my foot down hard against the tiles. "Iggy is part of my flock, and therefore my responsibility. I can't leave him like that!"

Professor Henry opened his mouth to reply, but before he could do so, Angel stepped between us.

"Let her go in," she said to the professor. "I think she can do it, and we need Iggy back. We can protect her if anything happens." She looked at Fang. "Right?"

Fang glanced at me, his expression conflicted. I stared back at him, determined to get my way. He looked at me for a long moment, then sighed and looked back down at Angel.

"Yes, Ange," he said, "we can."

The professor looked at a loss. "Are you _sure_?"

I knew he wasn't talking to me, obviously I was sure, but when Angel and Fang both said "Yes", he sighed and walked over to the monitor bank.

"Okay, Max," he said, "I guess you're going in."

* * *

**A/N: Whew. One eighteen hundred word chapter squeezed in after my sixteen hundred words per day quota. I hope you're all very, very happy. Though I'll admit that the break from my NaNo was rather nice. I did it last year with a oneshot, so I had to do it with something this year. =)**

**Anyway, just because I'm ridiculously busy with NaNoWriMo doesn't mean I wouldn't very much appreciate reviews.  
**


	20. Extraction

**A/N: NaNoWriMo's over (and yes, I did win), so updating will be back on schedule, hopefully. I was really getting into the whole once a week thing before November. Maybe I can get back into that. =)  
**

* * *

**101**

"You okay?" Tess asked him curiously. "You look kind of depressed."

Iggy looked up at her, trying to snap himself out of his mood. "I'm sorry. I've got a bit on my mind, that's all."

She had just opened her mouth to reply, when Max appeared in front of the bench they were sitting on. Tess shrieked, her eyes going wide. Iggy groaned. _Not again,_ he thought. _Can't they just leave me alone?_

"How did you do that?" Tess asked, her voice small.

Max glanced at her. "Long story, and I'm sorry to scare you like that. It's just that I really need to talk to Iggy."

Iggy clenched his jaw angrily. "Did Angel not take the message back?"

"Oh, she did," Max said. "I get that you don't want to come out. That doesn't mean you're not going to, though."

Tess looked between them. "What is this? Some kind of family problem?"

"You could say that," Iggy said, staring moodily at the ground.

"Iggy, please," Max said. "You have to believe me. This isn't real, no matter how happy you are. I know it's hard to let go, but if you don't, you're only doing exactly what the School wants you to do."

"I don't care," he said. "Haven't you figured that out yet?"

Max sighed, looking sad. "Yeah, I have. I guess my job is to make you care, then. How about a run-down of what's going on outside?"

**

* * *

102**

Fang was the only one not watching the monitor. He trusted Max to get Iggy out, so he figured there was less of a point in watching that than there was in keeping a good ear toward the hall outside. If anyone decided to show up, he didn't want to be taken unawares.

As it turned out, he had the right idea. Not even five minutes after Max had been hooked up to Iggy's machine, he heard the stomping sound of many security guards coming their way.

"Guys," he announced, "I think we may have a problem."

Professor Henry turned away from the screen to look at him. "What sort of problem?"

Fang jabbed his thumb toward the door. "Someone's coming, and they sound dangerous."

The professor immediately sprang into action. He rushed over to the computer and started typing, while issuing commands.

"Fang, pull that metal bar down in front of the door. Jones, activate the anti-Stunner field. Nudge, Gazzy, go into that closet and pull out metal rods that are in there. You can all use those as weapons."

"What about me?" Angel asked as they all went to do as the professor had instructed.

He glanced up briefly. "Keep an eye on that monitor. I want to know if anything goes wrong."

Once they'd all completed their tasks, they waited tensely, metal rods in hand. Fang couldn't help glancing back to where Max lay, unconscious. So many things could go wrong with this scenario, and if anything happened to her…

He shook his head, letting go of those thoughts. Nothing was going to happen to Max. They were all going to make sure of that.

A loud noise came from the door, the sound of someone throwing themselves fruitlessly against it. The door didn't even shake. After two more of these, there was a pause, and then part of the metal of the door suddenly turned orange, then melted away completely.

"They're using lasers," Doctor Jones said.

"I know," Professor Henry replied. "I expected them to."

They watched as the glowing orange-ness made a slow square around the perimeter of the door, finally meeting back up with the place it had started. Then the door fell inward, barely missing Fang's elbow. Glancing across the doorway, he saw that Nudge had also had to quickly pull her arm out of the way. Maybe they shouldn't have stood quite so close.

The metal door made an enormous bang as it hit the tiles of the lab, and security guards immediately began marching in. He and Nudge were able to take out three guards with their metal rods before the others realized what was happening. The guards stopped coming through, obviously aware of the fact that walking through the doorway could prove dangerous.

A few seconds later, a hand came around the side of the doorway and jabbed Fang in the arm with a small device. He expected to pass out or something, but nothing happened. Glancing over at Professor Henry, he saw that the professor was wearing a self-satisfied expression. Interesting.

Apparently the person on the other side of the wall didn't realize that it hadn't worked, because the security guards began marching through the doorway again. The metal rods did their job on more guards, but too many of them were coming through to keep up with them. By the end of it, thirteen guards had climbed over the unconscious bodies of their comrades to stand in the laboratory.

_Thirteen overly-powerful guards,_ Fang thought hopelessly, _against three relatively powerful birdkids, a mind reader, and two scientists. We're dead._

Of course, he didn't say that out loud. As the stand-in leader of the flock, that would be very bad for morale. Instead he just walked up behind the nearest security guard and walloped him over the head with his metal rod.

Chaos ensued.

* * *

**103**

"So you're telling me that if I don't come out with you," Iggy said, "you're going to leave me behind at the School?"

Well, that wasn't exactly what I'd said. I briefly considered not setting him straight and seeing if that would make him more inclined to leave his paradise, but decided against it. Lying to my flock could never be a good idea.

"No, Ig," I said. "We'll just unplug you, forcefully removing you, and drag your unconscious body through the halls as we make our escape. It's not the preferred option, believe me."

"I don't understand," Tess said. "Are you trying to tell us that this isn't real?"

I turned to her. "Okay, look. You seem like a great girl, Tess, but this has got nothing to do with you. I would suggest going home."

She shook her head stubbornly. "I'm staying with Iggy."

I sighed. What was it with over-protective girlfriends trying to stop me from freeing my flock members? "No, you're not. That's not possible, I'm sorry." I turned to Iggy. "Are you coming? Please?"

Iggy's anger seemed to have faded, but he still looked very unhappy. "I…I don't know. Can't you understand how hard this is, Max?"

Yes, I could. That didn't mean I was going to be any less pushy about getting him out. We were on a tight schedule, and I wasn't going to let Iggy's pigheadedness stop us from escaping the School.

"Just because it's hard doesn't mean you can't do it, Iggy," I said. "I know you can do this. Think about what you'll be getting back. Isn't it worth it?"

"Doesn't really seem like it," Iggy said miserably. He sighed. "I hate how I know you're right."

I smiled. "I know."

Just then, the clouds that had been floating peacefully in the serene blue sky zoomed around to form words.

_THINGS WENT BAD. NO TIME TO UNHOOK YOU. GET OUT OF THERE._

I stared at it. Looked like the worst-case scenario had just become reality.

"Okay, Iggy," I said, pointing up at the clouds. "See that? That means we're out of time and you really need to get us out of here _right now_. Can you do that?"

He looked extremely startled. "What? How?"

I waved my hands around vaguely. "Just unbelieve. It's not that hard." I knew as soon as I said it that I wasn't being particularly helpful. Rephrasing, I said, "Once you've got yourself completely convinced that this isn't real, the machine will let you go. Fang found it helpful to hover a bit so that he wasn't touching anything. You could try that, if you wanted."

"You seem to be assuming that he's going to cooperate," said Tess. "What if he doesn't want to go with you?"

"I know he doesn't want to go with me," I told her, "but I also know that he knows the flock is counting on him. That we need him, despite any passing thoughts he may have had to the contrary. Right, Iggy?"

He looked up at me, his eyes conflicted. Then he slowly nodded. "Yes."

"Exactly." I stared at Tess, daring her to argue. She didn't.

Iggy looked at Tess for a minute, then swooped in to kiss her.

"Oh, come on!" I said, exasperated. "Can we please get going?"

"I'm sorry," Iggy told Tess. Then he unfurled his wings and jumped into the air.

Tess watched him for a moment, looking dazed. I was surprised she wasn't yelling about how he had wings, and I wondered if Iggy had told her. From her expression, though, I didn't think he had. She just seemed to be taking it very well.

I shook my head. How easy it seemed to be to start thinking about computer simulations as real people. Yeesh.

It took longer than it had with Fang, but eventually the park started to fade around us.

The last flock member had been freed.

* * *

**A/N: And there we go. Review?  
**


	21. Blind

**A/N: I'm sure you'll all be happy to know that I finished my NaNoWriMo. Or not, but I thought I'd tell you anyway. 50,000 words and a done novel, unlike last year, where I kept writing for a couple weeks afterward.**

**So here's the chapter. =)**

* * *

**103**

The Director glared at Jeb, who had been called back to her office yet again. "You know how much I hate being left out of the loop. Tell me what's going on. Now."

Jeb tried not to show his anxiety outwardly. The Director was like a wild animal; if she sensed your fear, you were a goner. "Well, twenty-five security guards were sent to the laboratory to capture the experiments–"

"Excuse me?" she said. "I was never informed that the experiments had been located."

"Oh, uh…" Jeb licked his lips nervously, then mentally cursed himself for doing so. "We discovered that they were with the two scientists, back in the lab where they'd been held before."

"The two scientists that had been captured for aiding the flock?" the Director asked, an eyebrow raised. "The two scientists that I had sent for earlier? The two scientists that should have been under heavy guard because we know how dangerous they could be if the flock had access to their assistance?" Her voice rose steadily throughout her questions, and Jeb cringed back, biting his lip.

"Ah, yes," he said. "Those _are_ the scientists I was speaking of." In an attempt to keep the Director from having a reason to have him imprisoned or executed, he added, "But we're fairly certain that we'll have them all apprehended within the hour, so there's really no need to worry about it."

"I'm sorry," the Director said, her nostrils flaring, her hands splayed on her desk. "Are you _really_ telling me that there's no need to worry? These experiments have been causing us _nothing but trouble_ since we let them out of their first collective hallucination, and you think that now you've finally found the way to make them settle down and stop trying to escape? Are completely _delusional_?"

"I never said that," Jeb said. "I said that it's likely that they'll be recaptured. I think that they'll be fighting no matter how long we have them in captivity."

The Director stood back up, removing her hands from the desk. "You know what that means?"

He had a suspicion that he did, but he didn't say anything. The Director liked to be the one to say things like that.

"It means that it's time to terminate the winged experiments."

He knew he'd been right, as she said it with a sadistic smile on her face.

* * *

**104**

Iggy awoke to the sound of madness. Clashing, banging, clanging…It was all around him. Too much to bear, he opened his eyes to see what was really going on and put order to the tumult assaulting his ears.

Blackness.

How could he have forgotten? Order was for people who still had their sight. He was stuck in the disorder of blindness.

He lay still for what seemed like hours, but in all actuality was barely a minute. He knew he should be doing something. If everything that Max had told him was true, the battle going on around him was one that would benefit from his help. Too bad he couldn't find it in himself to move.

He'd been so good at getting around before his month with sight. Now he could barely figure out how big the bed he was lying on was. How was he supposed to manage himself in a fight? Might as well just surrender.

Then a memory of Virginia popped into his mind. He remembered sitting on the curb, moping about how useless he was. What was it that Max had said to him?

"_Iggy, I need you. I love you. I need all of you, all five of you, to feel whole myself. Now get up, before I kill you."_

He smiled. She'd always known just what to say, that Maximum Ride. And she'd almost always been right, too. He was being selfish and useless again, and if she could, she would probably give him a similar speech now.

Iggy closed his eyes, ignoring the nagging voice that was telling him it didn't matter because he was blind anyway, and took a deep breath. He focused on the beeping of the machines around him, trying to tune out the larger noises. It didn't work completely, but he managed it enough to make everything seem a little less chaotic.

Slowly, carefully feeling the bed underneath him, he slid his legs around and over the side. As he was doing so, he felt something fly over his head, almost hitting him. Whatever it was, it sounded heavy. It also made him remember where he was, and, relying entirely on instinct, he dropped off the bed and crouched next to it.

He suddenly realized that was what he'd always done. Why bother thinking about it if you knew that your instincts were good enough to do it for you? No wonder he was finding it so hard to figure everything out. The point was really that he didn't _need_ to figure it out.

He was about to get up and dash into battle when all of the sounds of battle suddenly stopped. He heard a man's voice say, "No, you don't need to do that." The tone of voice was warning, but the man also sounded rather scared.

There was no reply, only a very loud bang.

Then Iggy heard Fang yell Max's name.

* * *

**A/N: O_o What could **_**possibly**_** have happened?…Oh, wait, I know the answer to that, don't I? Heh heh.**

**Anyway, sorry the chapter's so short, and so late. I had some trouble working out the many glitches in its timing and whatnot. But you probably don't want my excuses, do you? I, however, would love your reviews.**

**And yes, I do happen to like Shinedown. The "sound of madness" thing wasn't just a coincidence. =P  
**


	22. Anger

**A/N: When I first wrote this chapter, I wasn't entirely sure I liked it. But after I reread it, I decided that maybe I do. I'll just let you form your own opinions, why don't I?  
**

* * *

**105**

Fang had watched as the security guard pulled out a gun. He had watched as the guard had pointed the gun at Max. He had watched as Max sat up, still groggy and disoriented from coming out of Iggy's fantasy. He had watched as the guard had pulled the trigger. He had watched as the bullet had headed straight for Max's heart.

Now he was watching as Max slumped back against the bed, blood beginning to run down her shoulder and arm.

He was vaguely aware of hearing himself shout, and then he turned and launched himself at the guard. The only idea present in his mind was to make the guard pay for what he had done.

Fang was furious and out for blood.

He didn't feel any of the blows the security guard landed on him, and with the help of his metal rod quickly took the large man down. He had just enough presence of mind to knock the guard out instead of killing him, but beyond that, Fang might as well have not been in his own body at all.

The rest of the flock jumped on the few remaining security guards, and Fang took the opportunity to dash over the fallen door and out into the hallway.

Someone at the top had ordered for this to happen, and he was going to find out who.

* * *

**106**

The Director had made her way to the security room, and was now watching the battle on one of the many monitors in the room.

"Can someone please tell me why it is that we didn't know what was going on by these cameras?" she asked. "We should have known about this problem sooner."

"Ah, well…" The man sitting at the desk looked like he didn't really want to answer that question. "We kind of…well… No one was manning this station, ma'am."

Her eyes narrowed. "_Excuse _me?"

The man seemed to shrink into his seat. "It's been years since anything even mildly interesting has happened. I… I thought that our men would be better off doing other things. More useful things."

"I'm afraid I don't remember giving you the authority to make those kinds of decisions," the Director growled. "From now on, I want at least _two_ men in here at all times. Do you understand?"

The man nodded meekly. "Yes, ma'am."

She turned back to the monitor, just in time to see the leader of the winged experiments take a bullet. "Oh, excellent. The others should be soon to follow, then."

Except they weren't. After that, they took the rest of the guards down with surprising ease. It took them a little while, but it didn't seem to pose any bit of a challenge. The Director stared at the monitor, frustration rising in her.

"Um…" the man at the desk said. "Are… Are they supposed to be doing that?"

"No, they are _not_!" the Director yelled. "How can they still be fighting? What can they possibly be fighting _for_?"

"The fact that you're asking that question," said a voice from behind them, "proves that you will never be able to stop us."

She whirled around, staring in shock at the dark-haired experiment standing defiantly in the doorway. He looked angry, and as he made his way toward her, she realized that he was actually taller than she was. Whose idea had that been? Why hadn't they decided to experiment with winged rats, or something similarly small and weak-willed?

"You want to know what we're fighting for?" he asked, his voice sounding tight with barely controlled rage.

She sneered at him, attempting to keep her controlling exterior despite the fact that she was ever-so-slightly afraid of this rogue experiment. "I don't really care."

"Really?" he said. "Because you asked." He stopped moving toward them, looking too much at ease for the Director's liking. "How would you feel if someone kept you in a cage for your entire life? And can you really say you would like it if someone shot the person that you cared about most in your life?"

Why was he asking her these questions? It wasn't like these things would ever happen to her. And it had been so long since she had actually cared about anyone, how could she accurately answer the second question?

Not wanting to admit that his words had shaken her, she slammed down the walls on any part of her mind that was reacting to them.

_He's just an experiment,_ she told herself. _He doesn't know what he's talking about._

But it was terribly hard to convince herself of that when he was watching her with those angry, passionate eyes that looked so human.

"I don't care about anything!" she shouted, then stopped, realizing that her words would have been much more convincing if she had said them quietly. But who was she trying to convince?

Because, against all of her principles and beliefs, it seemed like the person she was most trying to convince was herself.

* * *

**107**

Despite the fact that he had come into the room ready to knock out its inhabitants and move on to find whoever was in charge of the School, Fang had to admit that he was finding it rather entertaining to watch the woman in front of him have a minor mental breakdown.

"Is that true?" he asked. "You sound like you care about something."

He could see the battle in her eyes. He wasn't exactly sure what the sides of the battle were or who was winning, but this woman was fighting with herself.

"You're wrong," she said, her voice lower this time. "You have no idea what you're dealing with."

He shrugged. "Well, I guess that's true. I don't really know _who_ I'm dealing with, anyway. I don't suppose you're important around here?"

"Important?" she spluttered. "_I'm in charge!_ I run this place, you winged freak!"

"That's not really a new insult," he informed her. "You being the top dog around here does speed things up, though."

Her eyes looked wary now. "What do you mean?"

"I was looking for you," he said. "I'm going to assume that you're the one who gave the order to start shooting us, am I right?"

"Yes," she said, her expression hardening. "You became too much of a nuisance. It was necessary for you to be terminated."

He nodded. That's what he had expected. "So it looks like you're the one I'm going to have to take out as payback for Max."

"I suppose," she agreed. "However, you'll have to get through all of them before you can do that."

Fang looked behind him to see five guards blocking the door. Well, it wasn't like he'd thought this was going to be easy.

And at this point, making someone pay for Max's death was far more important to Fang than anything that happened to him while he was doing it.

* * *

**A/N: Reviews are AMAZING, just for the record. =)  
**


	23. Hostage

**A/N: I know, I suck. I'm really sorry it's taken me so long to get this chapter up. Forgive me? And, um… R&R?**

* * *

**108**

The Director watched as the winged experiment fell into an easy fighting stance. She nearly laughed at that. She'd seen him in action and knew he was good, but she'd seen her guards in action as well and knew that they were better. This wasn't even going to last a minute.

Then, before she had time to even wonder what was going on, the experiment had darted around behind her and grabbed her arms, twisting one of them behind her back hard enough to cause pain. She gasped, and the five guards in the doorway faltered.

"Tell them to get rid of their guns," the experiment said, his voice low.

"No," she said. "Never."

The guards had pulled out said guns now, but they seemed reluctant to shoot until she gave them the say-so. She trusted their aim since they'd been trained to be the best, so she opened her mouth to tell them to go ahead. Before she could get the words out, though, her arm was twisted around even farther. She resolutely held in the cry of pain this time, not wanting to give this rogue experiment any bit of satisfaction.

"Have you ever had your shoulder dislocated before?" he asked her. "I have. It hurts like hell."

She clenched her jaw, not bothering to tell him that no, she hadn't. In fact, she'd pretty much been shielded from any physical pain at all.

"I am the director of this organization," she said. "You _will_ let me go."

He snorted. "What kind of threat is that? Or were you trying to pull an Obi-Wan Kenobi on me?" He put a little more pressure on her arm. "Tell them to drop their guns."

Glancing up slightly, the Director saw that the man who had been running the security booth was still there, his eyes wide and his hands clenched on the arms of the chair. She narrowed her eyes at him, hoping that she was getting her message across. Almost immediately, she could tell he wasn't getting it. She growled in frustration, and was rewarded with more pressure.

She'd had enough. "Drop your guns!" she yelled at the guards. "Now!"

They did so immediately, only proving how little intellect they had. She was going to have to work that bug out of the next batch. Then maybe they would actually do something in situations like this. Though she had to admit that she was sincerely hoping there wouldn't _be_ any more situations like this.

"Thank you," the experiment said. "Now–"

He broke off abruptly, and the Director glanced up to see what had made him do so. At first she didn't see anything, but then she noticed that on the screen that showed the lab, the leader of the winged experiments was slowly sitting up.

"Damn it!" the Director hissed, but that definitely wasn't the reaction of the experiment behind her.

"Max," he whispered.

She heard so many things in his voice, it suddenly became impossible for the Director to see him as just another experiment, as much as she wanted to.

Experiments weren't supposed to love.

* * *

**109**

Fang stared at the screen. Max wasn't dead? But he'd seen the bullet! What could have happened to stop it from killing her?

He managed to keep his hold on the Director, even with his shock. Once he'd gotten his emotions under control, he leaned back down to talk to her.

"Tell your guards to move out of my way," he said. "I need to get out of this room."

She shook her head. "I don't think so. Don't you think I know that I've got you trapped?"

"And don't you think I know that I've got you twisted up and in pain?" he retorted. "Tell them to move."

"No."

"I'm getting out of here no matter what," he said, his voice hard and determined. "It'll make it a whole lot easier on you if you just do what I'm telling you to."

She tried to shrug, apparently forgetting that she shouldn't do that. He heard her whimper slightly as her shoulder moved even farther away from where it was supposed to be. He pulled a little more, just enough to put her back in the pain she'd been in when she'd ordered the guards to drop their guns.

"Do it," he growled. "Before I lose my patience."

"Move away from the door!" she shouted at the guards, her voice lanced with pain. "Don't attack this experiment as he leaves, either."

Fang didn't bother wondering if she added the second part because she knew that he'd make her anyway, or if she had actually decided to let him go. At this point, it didn't matter anymore. He had somewhere else to be.

That didn't mean he was just going to let the Director get away with it all, though. He relaxed his grip on her arm only slightly, still keeping her in a hold that would make it extremely uncomfortable for her to attempt an escape. Then he headed for the door, dragging her with him.

"What are you doing?" she shrieked. "I did what you wanted!"

"I know you did," he replied, "but you've still got a lot to pay for."

He half-carried her through the halls, ignoring her protests. When they reached the lab, he moved behind her and pushed her in front of him through the doorway.

"Got any handcuffs?" he asked Professor Henry, ignoring the dropped jaws of the two Whitecoats. "I'm tired of holding her like this."

After a minute of blank staring, the professor seemed to shake himself awake. "Uh, no. If you can get her over to one of those beds, though, we can strap her down."

Iggy, Nudge, and Gazzy moved forward to help, and they managed to get the Director strapped down on the bed that had been Fang's for the previous month. Fang allowed himself a moment of vindictive pleasure about that, and then he was moving over to where Max was lying.

Her shirt was still covered in blood, but there was a bandage around her chest and her eyes were open. He just looked at her for a moment, resisting the urge to pull her into his arms. He didn't think that would be good for her wound.

Finally, he managed, "I thought you were dead."

She smiled wryly. "People always count me out too soon." She reached out and punched him weakly. "Heard you went charging out of here when I got shot. That was kinda stupid."

"Like I told you, I thought you were dead," he said simply. "How are you not?"

"Guess I got lucky," she said. "The doctor said the bullet missed my heart by enough that it didn't kill me immediately."

Fang couldn't say anything else. His intense relief was overwhelming him.

Max just looked at him, then said, "I think I know exactly how you feel."

* * *

**A/N: I can't believe you guys actually thought I killed Max! I honestly didn't think I was fooling anyone with that.**

**Anyway, now she's back. Review out of happiness?**

**Oh, and if there are any glaring problems with any medical facts here, please let me know. I really know nothing about that, despite the House episodes I've watched, so any corrections would be appreciated.  
**


	24. Doubletake

**A/N: Well, my once a week updating seems to have flown out the window. Sorry 'bout that. I've had to start Driver's Ed, and it's seriously messing up my lovely, laid-back, homeschooled schedule. -grumble grumble- But I'll try not to let it slow down my updating _too_ much.**

**So I made a poll on my profile, and so far the results are… Interesting. Anyway, if anyone wants to check it out, just thought I'd mention it. (It has nothing to do with the story, just to make sure there are no misunderstandings.)  
**

* * *

**110**

Ugh.

That was pretty much the only thing going through my mind, repeating itself over and over. It fluctuated between a vague "Ugh…" and a more adamant "_Ugh!_", but either way it was caused by the same thing.

I guess my lesson for the day was that getting shot in the shoulder _really freaking hurts_. Just in case you were thinking about doing it to get out of a nasty math test at school or something. My advice: Don't. Because… Ugh.

Even though I was in pain, I somehow managed to not make any noises of discomfort when the others moved me from the bed I'd been lying on to a hospital gurney. That doesn't mean I wasn't making any noises at all, though.

"I can walk, really," I protested. "This is ridiculous."

"You're ridiculous," Fang said, rolling his eyes. "We're not going to take the risk of you pulling something and bleeding to death."

"Like that would even happen," I muttered, attempting to cross my arms. _Bad_ idea, let me tell you. My eyes watered in pain and I immediately dropped my arms back to my sides.

Fang smirked at me, his expression saying everything. I sighed. I may not like it, but they were probably right. So, accepting the inevitable, I laid back and shut up.

Once I was safely settled on the gurney, Professor Henry immediately began giving orders to the rest of the flock and Doctor Jones, obviously making the preparations that would be necessary to let us head out for the loading docks. Partway through his instructions, though, he was interrupted.

"And just what do you plan to do with me?" came the voice of the woman Fang had brought back with him. She was strapped down on a bed and entirely immobile, which I was glad of, because the look on her face was absolutely livid. I knew that if she'd been able to, she would have been doing everything in her power to get us all out of action. Maybe even to kill us.

"Who _are_ you?" I asked.

The woman just turned red and started spluttering, so Professor Henry took the liberty of explaining.

"This is the Director, Max," he said. "She's the one in charge of this whole place. She's the reason you're all in this situation. Of course," he added, seemingly as an afterthought, "she's also the reason you exist. Do you think those two things cancel each other out?"

I stared at the angry woman who was apparently the reason for every horrible thing I had ever gone through. Somehow, I couldn't connect that in my brain. The image I had in my brain of my symbol of suffering… Well, I didn't actually have one. But I knew that there was no way it would look like the Director if I did. Her physical presence was surprisingly small for someone with so much impact on the things around her, and restrained as she was, she didn't look particularly menacing.

"If you say so," I said, letting my head fall back against the gurney's pillow.

There was a moment of silence, then the Director repeated, "What do you plan to do with me?"

Fang glanced at the two scientists, who were both looking at him, then at me. Then he shrugged. "I didn't have any plans. Up until about five minutes ago, I was doing everything completely on impulse."

"Well, then," Doctor Jones said. "It looks as though we may have to just leave her there."

The Director didn't seem to like that at all. "There are people in this institution who will hunt you down and kill you for what you're doing."

At this, Fang smiled slightly, a strangely knowledgeable gleam in his eyes. "I don't think that's true. I think that everyone around here only does things if _you_ tell them to. In fact, I'd bet that if we killed you now, this entire operation would fall apart."

I looked up at Fang, unexpectedly seeing something in him that I'd never really noticed before. I don't even think I would have seen it if I hadn't been watching the scene from two feet below where my line of sight normally was. Something about the way he was standing, and the way the harsh white of the fluorescent lights accented the angles of his face… He seemed suddenly more defined than he ever had before. Colder, maybe, but at the same time determined and fiercely protective of everything he thought deserved to be protected.

As I was still reeling at this abrupt new image of someone I'd known my entire life, the said someone looked down at me, catching my gaze with his. I don't know what he saw there, but it seemed to confuse him. His eyebrows drew together slightly, and he tilted his head, watching me. I felt like I should say something, but nothing came, even when I opened my mouth to let it out. So I just snapped my mouth closed again and looked away.

It felt oddly like I'd broken something when I did.

* * *

**111**

Why had Max been looking at him like that? Fang kept watching her, even after she'd looked away, wondering what she could have seen to make her look so disconcerted. The worst thing was, he couldn't decide if her expression had been positive or negative, and since he somehow knew that it related directly to him, he would have really liked to know that.

While he and Max had been having a small staring contest, it seemed as though the rest of the flock had been collecting and organizing the things that the professor had asked them to.

"Excellent," Professor Henry said. "We've got less than twenty minutes to get down to the loading docks, and if we miss this opportunity, I have the feeling we won't get to try again. With all this uproar, they're sure to put us into lockdown at some point."

"If I had any way," the Director said grouchily, "I would most certainly be throwing the switches myself."

"Sucks that you're stuck here then, doesn't it?" Fang said unsympathetically. "I'm sure the rest of the morons that you've got around here will take at least a couple hours to figure out that there's trouble."

Fang heard Iggy say, "Ooh, _burn_." He couldn't figure out why, until Professor Henry raised an eyebrow in his direction.

"I'm going to let that one slide," the professor said, "on account of you being righteously angry."

Thirty seconds too late, Fang remembered that the two men standing next to him were technically part of the School's personnel.

"Ah," he said. "Sorry. But if it's any consolation, I only said that because I'd forgotten that you're part of this…organization."

Iggy snickered, but the professor smiled in a way that clearly said 'No hard feelings'.

"So," Nudge said cheerfully, "are we leaving?"

* * *

**112**

Jeb rushed into the security room to find five stoned-looking security guards and one electrical technician who looked like he might be in shock.

"What the hell _happened_ in here?" he bellowed, feeling an odd pleasure at being able to be the one shouting. He was sick of feeling like he was under the Director's thumb all the time.

None of the guards even twitched, but the technician behind the security desk made a slight whimpering noise. Jeb zeroed in on him.

"Tell me what happened," Jeb said, attempting that voice that wasn't quite shouting, but somehow seemed even more deadly because of it. The Director had that voice down to an art form, but Jeb was sadly less accomplished. To himself, he sounded like a madman who was just as likely to shoot himself in the head as he was to shoot the man in front of him. Not trying that again, then.

"P-please d-don't k-kill me, s-sir," the terrified man stuttered. "I d-didn't mean to let him t-take her. I just…couldn't m-move."

"You may as well be speaking in tongues," Jeb informed the man. "I would appreciate a more detailed and informative reply. And stop stuttering."

The man nodded, his eyes wide. "Sorry, sir." He took a deep breath, then began in a rush, "The-tall-dark-experiment-came-in-and-threatened-the-Director-and–"*****

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Jeb interrupted. "Did you not hear what I just said about speaking other languages? Because it's getting worse. Either tell me slowly and coherently, or I reserve the right to have you tortured, starved, and then fired."

The man nodded again, even more frantically this time. Then he visibly tried to calm himself down, and said his next words in a slow monotone. "The tall, dark, winged experiment came in and threatened the Director. She meant to have the guards kill him, but he took her hostage and hurt her until she told them to drop their weapons and let him leave. He left, but he didn't let her go and he took her with him. I don't know where they went, because all of the cameras shorted out right after they left."

Jeb swore colorfully. "You mean to tell me that the experiments have the Director held _hostage_?"

"Yes, sir."

He closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. "I know where they'll have taken her. I'll send a team at once to retrieve her, and–" He broke off.

_Hang on,_ he thought. _The Director is gone._ That opened up a lot of possibilities. He was effectively the second-in-command, and if the Director was no longer there…

He smiled unpleasantly. Who said she needed to come back, really?

But it was probably still a good idea to retrieve those experiments.

* * *

**A/N: *For some reason, it deleted this whenever I had it without the dashes in between the words. The way I originally wrote it was all as one string of gibberish, which I liked better, but FFN decided to be mean and not let me. Anyone know why this might be? Or is it just being finnicky?  
**

**Review?  
**


	25. Stuck

**A/N: Well, it hasn't quite been two weeks…**

* * *

**113**

"You can't just leave me here!" the Director screeched at our backs as we made our way to the door. "I demand to be released!"

"Okay, look," Fang said, turning around. "The way I see it, we're actually doing you a favor. If we leave you here, someone will eventually come along and let you out. Your only other option is coming with us, and somehow I think you'd like that even less."

I couldn't see the Director from my position on the gurney, but her silence was enough of an answer even without the expression on her face.

"Tell me again why we're leaving her here?" Iggy said. "I can't see any reason for us to be doing _her_ any favors."

"Course you can't, Iggy," Gazzy said, grinning. "You can't _see_ anything."

A month ago, Iggy would have rolled his eyes and replied with a good-natured insult in Gazzy's direction. Now, though, his jaw tightened and he turned his face away from the rest of us. Gazzy looked baffled.

"I didn't mean it in a nasty way," he told Iggy, his eyes wide. "I'm sorry."

Angel went over to her brother and put an arm around him. "It's not your fault, Gazzy," she said quietly. "He just went through more than the rest of us, and I think it's going to be a while before he's back to being Iggy again."

"Just because I can't see," Iggy snapped, "doesn't mean I can't hear."

"Iggy," I said warningly, "it's not their fault. Keep it to yourself."

For a moment it looked like he was going to ignore me, but then he blew out a long breath and turned back to us again.

"I'm sorry, Gaz," he said. "Feel free to tune out anything I say. I'm just being bitter, and it has nothing to do with any of you."

Gazzy nodded, looking placated. "Alright."

The two scientists had been watching the scene from a few feet away, obviously not wanting to get involved in our 'family issues', but Doctor Jones seemed to deem it safe now. He walked over to Iggy and laid a hand on his shoulder.

"My deepest apologies," he said sincerely. "I feel terribly responsible for the things that have come of those fantasies I created, and I want you to know that if I could do _anything_ to help you, I would."

Iggy had his head tipped toward the ceiling and his arms crossed, looking like he was trying really hard not to care. "Well, there's just this one thing, really…"

"I know," the doctor said, sighing. "Trust me, if I figure that out, you'll be the first to know."

"How touching," the Director sneered. "It's good to know that my employees are so _soft-hearted_."

Professor Henry turned to glare at her. "Is that what you call it? Because I call it _being human_. Isn't it strange how these six ninety-eight percent humans have more humanity in them than you, a one hundred percent human, do?" He shook his head, chuckling softly. "Ah, the coincidences."

"What a speech," the Director replied. "How unfortunate that I don't give a damn."

"It is unfortunate," Professor Henry agreed. "Perhaps you should do some soul-searching. If you have one, that is."

This was all well and good–I certainly had no qualms about insulting the Director–but we had places to be.

"Um, Professor?" I said. "How long do we have left?"

He glanced at me, then down at his watch. "We appear to be down to fifteen minutes." I raised my eyebrows at him, and he nodded. "Let's go, everyone. We don't really have time to dilly-dally."

"Dilly-dally?" Nudge said questioningly. "Who _says_ that?"

The professor sighed. "Let's just get going, shall we?"

* * *

**114**

Our journey to the loading docks was surprisingly uneventful. All the way there, something was nagging me, telling me that there was something wrong with this picture. Where were the guards? Where were the Erasers? Where were the rest of the freaking _staff_?

It seemed unlikely to me that Fang could have been right, that with the Director out of action, the rest of the School's personnel would just fall into inaction as well. There had to be _someone_ else who wanted us recaptured or dead.

That's when I remembered someone who hadn't come to the front of my thoughts in a while.

"Professor?" I asked.

Professor Henry looked down at me. "Yes, Max?"

I bit my lip. "Um… What exactly is Jeb's position here?"

"Jeb?" he repeated, looking surprised. Then the surprise faded, and he seemed to realize something. "Jeb is effectively the Director's second-in-command. He has control if she's ever disabled." He looked up at Doctor Jones. "We'd better move faster."

Fang looked between the two men. "Why? What do you think Jeb is going to do?"

"I have no idea," Professor Henry replied, "but I'd really rather not find out."

The rest of the flock picked up their speed, and the gurney I was riding on started making a lot more noise.

I sighed. "Can't we go quickly and still be quiet?"

Fang grinned down at me. "Doesn't seem that way, but at least I'm not doing this." He slowed suddenly, then sped up, then slowed again…

"Ugh," I groaned, feeling suddenly ill. "Someone else can push this thing if you're going to do that."

He evened out, maintaining one speed again. "Like I would trust you with anyone else."

I frowned at that comment, deciding that replying could get me into a conversation that I didn't really want to have at the moment. Instead, I just closed my eyes and tried to ignore the fact that the rattling of the gurney's wheels and our more than audible conversation were drawing absolutely no attention to us. Or at least, no attention that had shown itself yet.

The loading dock turned out to be on a different level of the School than the lab, and we were forced to take an elevator down the appropriate floor. Nobody said anything on the ride down, and I knew that the same natural claustrophobia that was causing me to grip the edges of my gurney like it was trying to rip itself out of my hands was keeping the rest of the flock trapped in a fidgety silence.

There was a collective sigh of relief as the elevator came to a halt, but it quickly turned back into fidgety silence when the doors failed to open and let us out.

"What's going on?" I asked, all too aware of the fact that I sounded like I was having a heart attack. Honestly, I wasn't entirely sure that I wasn't. "Why aren't they opening?"

"I have no idea," Professor Henry said, pressing the button that was supposed to open them manually.

Nothing happened.

"What do you mean, you have no idea?" I exclaimed, my heart beginning to beat even faster.

The professor just looked at me helplessly.

I felt panic begin to rise up in my chest. Of all the things that could have happened to us, this was one of the worst.

Six intensely claustrophobic bird-kids, trapped in an elevator.

Things could only go downhill from here.

* * *

**A/N: Muahahahaha. I'm so mean to the flock sometimes. =]**

**Oh, and about the "one hundred percent human" Director thing, I realize that in the books, she was supposedly also genetically modified. However, I think that her being part Galapagos turtle is absolutely ridonkulous, particularly because unless she was already in her hundreds when she was modified, she would have been experimented on when genetic modification wasn't even advanced enough to do that. What was JP thinking?**

**On another note, I turn sixteen next Tuesday. =O Wish me luck in the world of the sweet sixteen! And a wonderful birthday present would definitely be an inboxful of reviews. -hint hint nudge nudge wink wink-  
**


	26. Demands

**A/N: So I almost posted the wrong chapter here. You can thank my keen observation skills that you didn't get the half-written chapter twenty-seven. I'm sure that would have very much annoyed everyone concerned. =P**

**Here's the right chapter. Enjoy.  
**

* * *

**115**

I hate feeling like I'm not in control of what's happening to me. Anyone who knows me knows that. I also hate confined spaces.

Following this logic, one can quickly come to the assumption that being trapped in an elevator would rank pretty high on my "Things I Hate" list.

The fact that I was trapped in an elevator with seven other people breathing the small amount of air, on a gurney and pretty much unable to move? Not helping, I can assure you.

"There has to be something we can do!" I said desperately. "Can't Nudge override the computer or something?"

Doctor Jones shook his head. "You can't access the elevator computer from inside any of the lifts. They're all controlled by the mainframe of the utility systems."

"That's stupid," I said bluntly, trying to keep my breathing under control. I knew that freaking out would only use up the air supply faster.

_It'll be okay, Max._

It took me a minute to realize that the thought wasn't mine. Despite the fact that she must have been terrified herself, Angel was trying to comfort me.

_No one is as scared as you are, _she told me, having obviously heard my thoughts. _Well, Fang might be, but he's really good at controlling his thoughts._

Of course he was. What _wasn't_ he good at?

_Thanks for trying to help, sweetie,_ I thought to her, _but I'll be fine. Why don't you put that powerful brain of yours to use trying to get us out of here?_

From the corner of my eye, I saw a small smile appear on her face.

_Okay, Max. Just don't have a panic attack._

I resisted the urge to scowl. I wasn't going to have a panic attack. Sheesh.

"What's so funny?" I heard Nudge ask, and I looked over to see Angel giggling to herself.

"Nothing," Angel replied innocently, but I knew she was laughing at me. Couldn't a flock leader get any respect around here?

"We're not going to make it," Professor Henry said. It sounded like he was talking to himself, but with the tiny space we were all in together, not to mention the nature of Avian American hearing, we all heard him.

"That's pessimistic," Fang said mildly.

"Yeah," Iggy agreed. "We're generally more of the 'they'll never break us, we can get out of anything' type. You may want to change your outlook if you're planning to hang with us."

Since Iggy happened to be standing right next to my gurney, I reached out and touched his arm to let him know that I appreciated his attempt to shake off his negative attitude. He nodded slightly, telling me that he got the message.

The professor looked up, seeming surprised at the response his comment had gotten. "That's not what I meant. I just meant that with the circumstances, I can't see us making it to the loading dock in time to get you on your truck."

"Considering that we have barely five minutes left," Doctor Jones said, looking at his watch, "I'd say you're probably right."

"What are we going to do, then?" Gazzy asked. "Do you guys–"

"HELLO, RENEGADE WINGED EXPERIMENTS AND TRAITOROUS SCIENTISTS."

* * *

**116**

The volume of the voice suddenly resounding inside of our tiny box of death made us all wince. Assuming that whoever was on the other end could hear us, I shouted, "Could you turn it down a bit?"

Either they couldn't hear us or they were just being spiteful, because their next announcement came out just as loud as their first.

"YOU ARE TRAPPED IN AN ELEVATOR."

"No crap," Iggy muttered.

"YOU ARE THERE BY MY JURISDICTION. YOU WILL NOT BE RELEASED."

"Is he serious?" Nudge asked, her voice sounding a little higher than normal. "Are we really going to be stuck in here forever?" She paused, then added, "Well, I guess it won't be forever. I mean, we'll starve first. Or suffocate. Or–"

"Nudge," I said, seeing the look on Gazzy's face. The fact that my mind had been following the exact same train of thought didn't really need to be known.

"IF YOU WISH TO LIVE, YOU WILL ANNOUNCE YOUR SURRENDER."

"Oh, will we?" I said wryly. "I don't think so."

"THIS IS YOUR ONLY OPTION, MAXIMUM. IT WOULD BE MOST UNWISE TO REFUSE."

"Okay, Jeb," I said, finally figuring out who it was due to the use of "Maximum", "I don't think you quite get it yet. We're not going to just surrender. I can't believe that you even think that's possible, after all the years you've known us. We always, _always_ fight, and we'll keep fighting until the very end. Got it?"

"YOU HAVE NO WAY TO FIGHT. WHAT COULD YOU POSSIBLY DO TO GET OUT OF YOUR CURRENT SITUATION?"

If he had a point, I wasn't going to admit it. Unfortunately, I couldn't think of anything to say to that. The truth was that we didn't have any way out. We were stuck.

Luckily, Fang had a response where I didn't. We made a good team like that.

"Why the hell would we tell you that?" he said. "You'd just stop us anyway."

"YOUR BLUFFING CAN ONLY GO SO FAR. JUST GIVE UP."

"Can you believe him?" I asked the room at large. "He really thinks that telling the same thing over and over again will actually change our answer? Everyone knows that never works."

"I DON'T EXPECT MY WORDS TO CHANGE YOUR MINDS, MAXIMUM. I EXPECT THE HOPELESSNESS OF YOUR SITUATION TO SLOWLY SINK IN AND DO THAT FOR ME."

The first response that popped into my head was both corny and ridiculous, and I was very glad that I had the presence of mind to keep it in.

Apparently a certain little blond mind read didn't find it as ridiculous as I did, though, because a moment later I heard Angel say, "Nothing's hopeless as long as you believe!"

Thank God none of the others would ever know where that had come from.

"Words of wisdom courtesy of Max," Angel added, smiling angelically. Feeling my dignity die a horrible death, I shot her a glare that would have withered a two hundred-year-old tree. She just continued smiling at me.

I was saved any taunting from the others by Jeb, of all people.

"IF YOU DON'T MAKE YOUR DECISION SOON, I'M GOING TO TURN OFF THIS INTERCOM AND LEAVE YOU ALL TO DIE."

"We've already made our decision," I said. "We'll never surrender. Now leave us alo–"

"I surrender."

The loud, firm voice made us all turn to look at the speaker in astonishment.

"I surrender," Doctor Jones repeated.

* * *

**A/N: Only YOU can prevent utter flock annihilation! (With reviews, of course.) **


	27. Surrender

**A/N: So I believe it's been...-checks date- Ten days since I last posted. That's not too bad, right?  
**

* * *

**117**

I couldn't believe it. What did Doctor Jones think he was doing? He couldn't be turning us in, could he?

_But then,_ I thought, _why would he want to be stuck in an elevator with us until he suffocated? He's probably just doing what anyone would do; acting in his own best interests._

I really hated it when the little voice of reason snuck in and started telling me exactly what I didn't want to hear.

I looked at Professor Henry, hoping that he would have that self-satisfied look on his face that said he and the doctor had a plan, but he looked as startled as the rest of us. He was staring at his coworker incredulously, and I realized that this really wasn't part of the plan.

"I'M GLAD YOU SEE SOME SENSE," Jeb said, though the volume of his voice and the cruddy quality of the speakers in the elevator made it impossible to tell what emotions were behind it. "UNFORTUNATELY, YOUR SURRENDER SAYS NOTHING FOR OTHERS. YOU HAVE CHANGED NOTHING ABOUT YOUR SITUATION."

That was where Jeb was wrong. The doctor had changed everything about our situation.

"I understand," Doctor Jones said stonily. I watched him, hoping for a wink or a reassuring smile… Nothing. Nothing to tell us that he was still on our side. "But I'm sure they understand that this is for their own good. Fighting will get them nowhere."

"I AGREE, BUT I DOUBT THAT THEY WILL–"

"We surrender."

I looked up at Fang, horrified. Him too? The doctor was one thing, but Fang? I really wouldn't be able to take it if he didn't have my back anymore.

Before my heart could wilt completely, though, he reached down and took my hand. His eyes seemed to be pleading with me to understand, and unfortunately, I did. He was taking everything into consideration, including the fact that I was pretty much out of action. Anything we did to start a fight would just mean more of a chance that something would happen to me, and he couldn't let that happen. I knew that I would be making the same decision if I was in his position.

That didn't mean I was happy about it, though.

I gave Fang a short nod to show that I understood, and relief crossed his face. Then I summoned up all of courage, and shoved my disgust at what we were doing down.

"I agree," I said, trying to make my voice sound feeble and panicked. "We surrender. Get us out of here."

We were going against all of our ideals by doing this, but sometimes, things like that just had to be done.

* * *

**118**

Iggy was incredulous. After all the grief Max had been giving him about giving up and not fighting, here she was, surrendering to Jeb. What a freaking hypocrite!

_She knows what she's doing, Iggy._

Angel's mental voice was unwanted and unappreciated, and he didn't bother responding. He needed something to be bitter about, after everything, and this seemed like a perfectly good candidate.

_Please don't be like that. We need to work together. I thought you were over this._

_I was trying to be!_ he thought at her angrily. _What's the point now, though? The Whitecoats can't be trusted after all, Max and Fang seem to have decided that everything we've stood for so far doesn't mean anything… Am I supposed to be okay with this?_

_You have to be,_ she said. _There aren't any other options._

She said nothing after that, leaving Iggy to dwell on it. And dwell on it he did, for a little while.

After a couple minutes, the elevator lurched suddenly downward, then stopped. There were exclamations from all of the occupants.

"What's going on?" Gazzy asked.

"I don't know," Max replied. "I hope Jeb's letting the elevator go."

They waited in silence for a moment, then the elevator began moving downward at its proper pace again. The ride was barely thirty seconds, and then the elevator stopped and settled. There was a ding, and Iggy heard the doors slide open.

Whatever Jeb had planned for them started here.

* * *

**119**

If I'd been terrified in the elevator, it was nothing compared to what I was feeling as we let the security guards "escort" us through the halls. My one consolation was that Fang had refused to hand control of my gurney over to anyone else, so I wasn't any more at Jeb's mercy than the rest of the flock.

We had missed our truck. I knew it, everyone else knew it. It seemed as though there was no longer a way out of the School for us. Jeb had outsmarted us, and there was nothing we could do about it.

"What are you going to do with us?" Iggy asked. We were all thinking it, but I had to give him credit for being the first one to have the guts to voice it.

Jeb didn't turn from his place at the front of the group of guards. "What makes you think I'm going to 'do' anything with you? That implies action of some sort, wouldn't you agree? It also implies you being alive."

I guess I had known somewhere in me that he planned to kill us. We knew that the Director had finally reached a point where she thought it was in her best interests to kill off her most successful genetic experiments, so there was really no reason that Jeb shouldn't be in the same frame of mind. And yet somehow, it still came as a bit of a shock.

"You would really do that?" Angel asked. Her voice was clear and sweet, almost daring Jeb to destroy something so innocent.

Jeb's reply was cold. "Why wouldn't I?"

As someone who had grown up in a lab, raised by men and women in white coats who wanted nothing more than to know exactly how I worked inside, you would think that I would have believed that there were people out there who had no soul. But strangely enough, I never really had.

Jeb was changing my mind.

* * *

**120**

The Director waited, strapped to a bed that should have belonged to the experiments she had for so long tried to dominate, for longer than she thought she should have. It was at least twenty minutes after the experiments had left that someone finally appeared in the doorway to the lab.

"It's about damn time!" she exclaimed. "As the one in charge of this place, you would think people would be a bit more prompt about getting me back in action."

The two guards didn't reply, merely walked across the lab and began to release the Director's bonds. Once they had finished, she swung her legs over the side of the bed and stood.

"First," she began, already preparing a mental list of things that needed to be done, "I want all delivery trucks immediately detained. No one leaves this facility unless I…" She trailed off, noticing that the two guards were stepping closer, looking decidedly threatening. "What are you doing?"

"We have been ordered to restrain you," one of them said. "Please don't fight. You'll only make it worse for yourself."

The Director's mouth dropped open in shock and indignation. "Ordered by _whom_, exactly? The last time I checked, my orders were the only important ones around here!"

"I'm sorry, ma'am," the guard said. "You proved yourself to be fallible, and your weakness is now being exploited."

Her eyes widened as she found herself surprised on multiple accounts. First, of course, was the fact that someone had undermined her. Second, and perhaps even more shocking, was the fact that this security guard was actually proving intelligent. "Fallible" and "exploited" were not words that most of them seemed capable of understanding, let alone using in their speech.

"May I inquire as to identity of this new high and mighty being?" she asked stiffly.

"No," was all she got in reply, and then she was being hauled out the door by her upper arms.

"How about what this unknown person plans to do with me?" she tried.

"I don't know," the guard told her, "but I can bet it's not pleasant."

As she was dragged through the halls of the place that had once been her empire, the Director thought that she had never in her life been more aware of the fact that despite all of her airs and pretenses, she was only human… And therefore entirely mortal.

* * *

**A/N: You know, I never meant to make Jeb the main antagonist of this story. I think I like how it's working out, though.**

**I feel like I should stop asking you all to review at the end of every chapter. Me saying it probably won't make anyone who wasn't planning on reviewing actually do it, and anyone who was planning on reviewing will still review even without me asking. So I think from now on I'll give that redundancy up, 'kay? =)**


	28. Imprisonment

**A/N: Wow. I am just so freaking scatter-brained sometimes. I meant to post this yesterday. I even told someone to check out the chapter that I was about to post, which I then failed to actually post. My apologies.  
**

* * *

**121**

Jeb took us through the halls of the School, and as we passed places that I'd known when I was younger, I felt a weird burst of nostalgia. I had no idea why, since I'd certainly been far from happy here. Maybe knowing that it had been my only experience in the real world had somehow changed my subconscious opinion of my life there.

When we finally came to a halt, I realized immediately where we were. It was the first floor of the cell block, three floors below where the younger set and the two scientists had been held earlier. At least they weren't putting us back in dog crates.

"I thought you said you were going to have us killed," Fang commented.

Jeb smiled coldly at him. "Oh, don't worry. That hasn't been taken off the agenda, but I don't believe I said that I was going to have you killed _now_."

Wonderful.

"Separate them," Jeb instructed the guards, waving his hands toward the cells. "I don't want them talking. The cells are all soundproofed," he added, looking at us, "so don't think that you'll be able to talk to each other and hatch any clever little plans."

You know, I think I liked it better when the Whitecoats failed to learn from their mistakes. This new intelligence was really putting holes in each consecutive plan that I came up with, immediately forcing me to dismiss them as useless.

Jeb turned and began walking down the hall, away from us. "Bring Max and let's go," he called over his shoulder.

My eyes widened. Bring me? Why did he want them to bring me? A dark feeling of foreboding fell over me, and I wondered if I was the one he planned to have executed first. Not to brag or anything, but I could see why he would. I tended to cause a lot of trouble.

I was fairly certain that Fang was thinking the same thing, because I saw him tense up and tighten his grip on the gurney.

"If she goes, I go," he said, his voice hard.

"You think I'd let you go just so you could try to save her?" Jeb asked, and I heard him chuckle slightly. "Don't be stupid."

Two guards came up behind Fang and grabbed his arms. "Let go," they both said. With the flat monotone and synchronization of their voices, I half expected them to add, "Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated."

Fang just shook his head, and I could tell he was getting ready to punch both of their lights out.

"Fang," I hissed. "Don't."

I knew that whatever was going to happen to me was going to happen. At this point, there was nothing we could do to stop it. I also knew that if Fang tried to protect me, he would just make things ten times worse for himself, and I wasn't going to let him do that.

I don't know if he understood all of that, but he did listen to what I'd said and didn't try to fight. He let go of the metal bar at the head of my gurney, and one of the guards took hold of it.

I was then wheeled down the hall after Jeb, away from my flock, to a lab where they lifted me off of my gurney and strapped me down to an operating table.

My last thought before they sedated me was that I really wished I'd said a better goodbye to Fang.

* * *

**122**

The Director's cell opened, and she squinted in the sudden light.

"What?" she snapped.

"No need to be unfriendly," Jeb said.

She snorted. "Right, because proper procedure when dealing with _backstabbing little traitors_ is to be perfectly polite."

"I'm only doing this for the good of science and progress," Jeb replied calmly. "You are no longer what is best for the company's interests. Since that is the case, you are no longer necessary, and must be dealt with."

The Director was too angry for words. No longer what was best for the company? Who was Jeb to even judge that? So she just glared at him, wishing that her glare could suddenly become something tangible.

Jeb just smiled slightly. "You know, I'm very much enjoying the fact that I know you've done this same exact thing to so many people. Your employees do have an odd tendency to end up…" He paused for dramatic effect, then turned to her and smiled fully. "Missing."

So she was a hypocrite. She knew that. She'd said and ordered many things in her life that she had later done the exact opposite of. This wasn't new.

Her being a captive in a cell, lorded over by someone who used to be afraid of her… That _was_ new.

"So when you say 'dealt with'," she said, "may I assume that you mean locked away until starvation kills me? Or perhaps you mean me to be hung. We have a very nice guillotine as well." She was glad that she managed to keep her voice sounding cool and detached. She raised an eyebrow. "So many excellent ways to kill someone, but only one life to take. I've had that problem many times."

"I recall," Jeb agreed. "Though I also recall that you solved the problem by simply using most of the methods to _almost_ kill them. Starvation can be a form of torture, as can hanging if it's performed properly." He frowned. "The guillotine does tend to be fatal, unfortunately."

"What I fail to understand," she said, changing the subject before she could lose her cool, "is why you want me killed. It seems to me that if you were smart, you would keep me around for my brains. Much as you might hate to admit it, I am ridiculously intelligent and knowledgeable. Killing me seems like such a waste, wouldn't you agree?"

"You flatter yourself," Jeb said shortly.

She smiled. "Yes, but only as far as the truth extends. No farther."

"There are reasons behind everything I do," Jeb said. "If I choose not to tell you what those reasons are, you'll just have to live with that." He turned and headed for the door.

The Director was suddenly struck by a thought. "Maybe you think I'm too dangerous to be kept alive. That if I were allowed to live, I would somehow threaten your new position as top dog. Is that it?"

Jeb didn't turn around, but she thought she noticed his posture tense a little. "Do you take me for a coward? You couldn't even defend yourself against one rogue experiment."

"I didn't say you thought that I would threaten your life," she said smugly. "I said that you thought I would threaten your leadership. I may have proved myself fallible, but I'm fairly certain that it would be easy for me to regain my former dignity and take back my position as leader if you weren't doing this."

"Maybe it would." He stepped out the door. "We'll never know, though, because I _am_ doing this. Say goodbye to your life, Marian."

Just before the door closed, the Director called out, "Guillotines can be used to remove limbs!"

* * *

**123**

Fang punched the wall of his cell, then cursed at the pain that shot through his hand. Trying to hold in a scream of frustration, he sank down into a sitting position, holding his throbbing hand.

How had he let this happen? It had been bad enough when he'd let Max get shot, and then there hadn't been that much he could have done about it, except maybe to have not let her go in to get Iggy in the first place. But this time? He may as well have just given her away, and that was unforgivable. He knew she was as good as dead now. She was injured and couldn't fight, and Jeb wanted her gone.

And he hadn't even really said goodbye.

"I should've kissed her," he muttered, then had to hold back a laugh. Like he would've had the chance.

He dropped his head back against the wall behind him, hearing the dull thud. He let all of his best memories of Max and the flock circle through his mind's eye. He tried to restrict it to real ones, but he couldn't stop remembering the Max in his paradise. He'd thought it was her. He'd thought he actually had her. Now he had to wonder if he'd ever even gotten close.

Hearing a slight noise, he instantly went on alert, his head snapping back up. Wasn't the cell supposed to be soundproofed?

Focusing on it, he realized that it sounded like voices, and it was coming from the back corner of his cell. Following the noise, he crawled alongside the wall until he came to the point that it was coming from. There was a beam of light streaming through the wall and slightly illuminating the barely lit cell. And there _was_ noise coming out of it.

"What I fail to understand is why you want me killed," he heard the Director say.

Fang sat back on his heels. This was quite the discovery.

He sat and listened to the rest of Jeb and the Director's conversation, raising his eyebrows when Jeb called her Marian. He hadn't really considered the fact that the Director might have a normal, human name.

Once they were done talking and Jeb left the other cell, the light went away. Fang assumed that the door to the Director's cell had been open, and now that it wasn't, the lighting was the same on the other side.

He took a deep breath, made sure that he was certain he wanted to do what he was about to do, and then said, "Hey."

There was a slight scuffling sound from the other side, and then a voice replied.

"I thought these cells were soundproofed."

Fang smirked. "So did I. I guess not even the School is incapable of messing up sometimes."

"The School?" the Director asked.

"It's what we call this place," he replied. "I think it came from the fact that when were younger, the scientists always told us that this was school, as in the educational kind. We were learning, or so they said."

There was a pause, then, "You're the experiment that kidnapped me, aren't you?"

"Fang," he snapped. "My name is Fang."

"Oh." Another pause. "Okay then… Fang."

"Thank you." He scooted around until he had found a comfortable position to sit in, without moving too far away from the hole. "So I hear you're in the same situation I am."

"That hardly seems likely. What situation are you talking about?"

"The 'slated for execution because you're too much trouble' one," he replied. "My whole family's got that problem. And the two Whitecoats who actually tried to do something decent and help us do too."

"I guess we are in the same situation."

"That's what I said." He paused, then said, "I don't supposed you have a way out of here?"

"Not yet."

"And here I thought talking to you might actually be useful." He heard a small chuckle from the other side of the hole, which surprised him. He hadn't thought the Director had any sense of humor that wasn't entirely sadistic. "Well, I'm going to try to get some sort of rest. Tell me if you actually come up with anything that could help us."

"Alright. And as much as I never thought I would say this, I hope you get out of here."

"You're only saying that because it would mean you could too."

She laughed again. "Obviously."

* * *

**A/N: So remember that poll I mentioned a few chapters back? Well, the results have been very interesting. According to the majority of the people who have voted on it, in 2012 our world is going to become a musical, leaving us all unable to refrain from breaking into random song. I just hope it doesn't turn out like that _Buffy_ episode... Anyway, I'm leaving the poll open, so you can still go vote if you want, but I just thought I'd mention that. It cracked me up when I saw what the favored option was. XD  
**


	29. Explanation

**A/N: I know it's been a while since the last chapter, and I'm very sorry. My feeble excuse is a horrible case of extensive writer's block that stopped me from writing anything. Followed by a week-long vacation at a water park that effectively stopped me from updating. But I finally managed to finish this chapter, so here it is.**

* * *

**124**

When I woke up, I was immediately confused. I hadn't thought that I would be waking up. Hadn't Jeb said that he was going to kill us?

I looked around and discovered that I was in a cell. How exciting. So now the question was: What had Jeb done to me in that lab?

The answer made itself immediately clear as I sat up, and then realized that I had been able to with absolutely no pain. So I had been healed? That didn't make any sense. Certain that there was some other reason for them to operate on me, I stood up and began patting myself down. When I found no signs of any chips, trackers, bombs, or other suspicious attachments, I sat back down, feeling a little ridiculous. It wasn't like they would give me something to work with. Whatever they had done to me was almost definitely internal and had every chance of killing me suddenly, painfully, and in a way that would go down in the annals of history if any government departments got wind of it.

If Fang had been there with me, I'm sure he would have told me to stop being so dramatic. Unfortunately for both of us, he wasn't, so I was left to freak out all by myself.

I think I nearly jumped through the ceiling when the door opened. (Not that I would have gone through it. In fact, I probably would have ended up as a nasty bird-kid pancake on the ceiling of the drab little cell.)

"Hello, Maximum," Jeb said, stepping into the cell. The doorway behind him was immediately occupied by two burly guards, who both shouldered their guns and did an excellent job of looking menacing.

I didn't really feel like talking to Jeb, but maybe I could at least get some answers about my strange new condition. I just nodded, silently running through ways to ask my questions that might actually get me replies that weren't utterly vague and cryptic. None of them struck me as particularly useful. Guess I was just going to have to hope that Jeb spilled the beans all by himself.

"I'm sure you're very curious about what's happening," Jeb said, smiling at me but not even bothering to hide the malice behind the expression. "Aren't you?"

I was sure he knew my personality too well for me to get away with trying to bluff him, so I went with the truth. "Oh, just a little."

Okay, so I spiced it up with a bit of sarcasm. Could you really blame me?

"Well, today is your lucky day, Maximum," Jeb said, "because I'm feeling in the mood to show off my brilliance."

One, what was with the repeated use of my full first name? Was it really necessary? And two, why did evil geniuses (not that I was crediting Jeb with genius; he just seemed to think he was one) always feel the need to "show off their brilliance"?

But at least it did seem as though I was going to get some answers.

"Great," I said, sitting down on the cot, kicking my legs out in front of me and folding my hands over my stomach. "Enlighten me."

I wasn't sure that I was actually fooling Jeb with my faux nonchalance, but it made me feel a little better to imagine that I might have had just a smidgen of control over the situation. Just call me OCD. Or I suppose you could call me the-winged-freak-locked-in-a-cell-with-no-idea-what's-going-to-happen-to-her-and-no-idea-where-her-family-is-or-if-they're-even-still-alive-who-wants-to-try-to-ignore-all-of-that-and-pretend-to-be-comfortable-so-she-doesn't-lose-it-completely. That would work too, but I suppose it's a bit of a mouthful.

"Alright, Maximum," Jeb said (there was that name thing again). "I'm glad we could understand each other so well." He seemed to be trying to pretend that we were friends, while at the same time making it blatantly obvious that he didn't care about me at all, beyond what experiments he could use me for. It seemed twisted and unnecessary, but maybe my sense of drama just wasn't advanced enough to understand its purpose.

There was a long pause, and finally I had to say, "So are you just going to stand there and hope that your genius shows itself to me on its own?"

He actually seemed a little annoyed by that, like he had planned the pause to be dramatic and I had ruined the mood. He didn't reply to my comment and just started into his explanation.

"So the technology that we developed and used to put you and your family into your separate fantasies has turned out to be very useful," he said. "We have expanded on it in multiple areas."

"That's nice," I said.

He smiled, ignoring my sarcasm. "It is, actually. You see, we've been able to use that technology to find another way to deal with you."

"Oh, happy day," I said.

I saw only a slight tensing in Jeb's expression in response to my comment. "I can see that you're not really understanding this. Why don't I put it simply? Maximum, we are going to give your bodies to people who will better use them. Is that simple enough for you?"

* * *

**125**

Crazy Jeb say what? How could he 'give our bodies to people who will better use them'? They were ours. I had thought that was a given.

Jeb was smiling widely now. "I see the very thought frightens you."

I raised an eyebrow. "You may be smart in other areas, but you suck at reading people. I'm not scared, I just have no idea what you're talking about."

Jeb sighed. "Are you going to force me to explain _every little detail_?"

"Hey, you're the one who said you felt like bragging," I said.

"I suppose that's true," he agreed, surprising me with his sudden affable tone. "So to elaborate, the technology that we used to make your brains believe that you were in a different reality was simple to modify, and can now be used to make your brain control an entirely different body. We will take one of our own soldiers and switch your minds, allowing us to have control of our best experiments in every way."

Wow. That sounded… less than good. For us, anyway.

"I guess so," I said, trying not to let my voice shake. "You get to use our amazing powers of flight and kick-ass-ness _and_ not have to worry about forcing us into submission. Kudos to you for creative thinking."

"I'm glad you seem to have grasped the concept," he said.

"Yeah," I said, "and I guess I know why you deigned to have the hole in my shoulder fixed. I just have one question."

Jeb smiled and gestured for me to ask away. He seemed to be taking an obscene amount of satisfaction from this plan of his.

"When we were in our alternate reality things," I said, "you had to hook us up to machines to make it work. Are you planning to keep your new super-soldiers on some huge extension cable or something?"

"Oh, no," Jeb said. "We've made it wireless."

Of course they had.

"Well," Jeb said, turning to the door, "I have things to do, so I'll just leave you to ponder what I've told you. Goodbye, Maximum."

I watched the door close with a kind of numb dread. Every time I thought we might be able to get out of this prison, something happened that made it all just seem that much more hopeless.

I was starting to think that the fates had something against us.

* * *

**A/N: This is insane. I just can't seem to get the flock out of the School! In all honesty, I had planned to have them out something like ten chapters ago, but new plot twists keep popping up and going, "Oh, please use me! You **_**know**_** it'll make the story so much more interesting!" They're usually right, but it's sort of making me feel really bad for the flock.**

**And just in case anyone is curious, I started a blog. URL perfectionandinsanity . blogspot . com, if you feel like checking it out. =)**


	30. Silhouette

**A/N: I'm sincerely sorry that it's been so long since I posted. I know I said that last time, and I know that at some point my excuses just aren't going to cut it anymore, but I do have my reasons. Summer is the season where I get both less computer time and less Internet time, because I spend more time at my own WiFi-less home doing stuff outside, and less time writing and going places with Internet. Also, I want to wrap this fic up sometime soon so I can work on my original stories, and writing without any idea where it's going is going to make it even longer, so I spent some time trying to figure out where it's going before I sat down to write this chapter.**

**Anyway, I'm hoping the next one gets done sooner because I do sort of know where I'm going now, but if it doesn't, please don't hold it against me. I still love the fic and its wonderful readers, I just don't have as much time to work on it.**

**I hope the chapter was worth the wait.**

* * *

**126**

"Fang!"

Fang jumped, startled by the low, urgent hiss of Max's voice. Was he hearing things? Assuming that he was going crazy, he settled back against the wall.

"Fang!"

That was actually a bit annoying. You'd think that if his subconscious was going to make him hear Max's voice, she could at least be a little more pleasant. But then, pleasant had never really been one of Max's strong points.

"Are you going to answer her?" said the Director from the next cell, sounding irritated.

So he wasn't hearing things.

…He wasn't hearing things!

"Max?" he asked hesitantly.

"No," came the sarcastic reply, "I'm just the other person who sounds like me."

"Normally I would be okay with your sarcasm," Fang said, "but Max II proved that's actually a legitimate concern."

"Touché," she said. "Now as much as I wish we had time for chitchat, we don't. Get up and let's get out of here."

He looked around the cell, narrowing his eyes when he saw nothing but darkness. "Where are you?"

"I'm in the cell with you, moron."

"You're _what_? How?" And how had he not noticed the door open and close?

"Stole the key from Jeb, snuck into the cell. Easy as pie." She certainly sounded like she thought it was nothing; her tone was relaxed and nonchalant to the point of being out of context.

"The cells have a number lock too," he pointed out. "You couldn't have stolen _that_ from Jeb."

"He writes the code on the back of his key card," Max replied. "You know, being the idiot that he is."

"I still don't understand how you got in here without me noticing."

From her voice, he guessed that she was grinning slyly as she said, "That's for me to know and you to find out, now isn't it?" There was a pause. "Didn't I say that we didn't have time for chitchat?"

"You did," he agreed. "I suppose we should go."

"We should, yeah."

The door slid slightly open, revealing a thin crack of light that outlined Max's silhouette. Grinning, Fang got to his feet and headed for the open door.

* * *

**127**

"She _escaped_?" Jeb roared at the two guards who had been in charge of keeping Max in her cell. "What do you mean, _she escaped_?"

"I thought we were pretty clear, sir," said one guard. He turned to the other guard. "The word 'escape's only got the one meaning, doesn'it?"

"I dunno," the other guard replied. "I think so."

"I KNOW WHAT YOU MEANT!" thundered Jeb. "What I'm failing to understand is _why_ she escaped. I posted you here because I believed you to be capable of containing her."

"Guess you were wrong, sir," the first guard said. "I dunno if any of us'd be able to do that. Those bird-kids are goddamn slippery."

Jeb's eyes bulged slightly. "There will be no disrespecting me, understood?"

"No disrespectin' meant, sir," the guard replied, saluting. "I said 'sir', didn' I?" There was a pause. "…Sir."

Jeb's eyes narrowed threateningly. "Find her. Find her quickly. I don't want her letting the rest of those miscreant bird experiments out of their cells. And try to do a better job at that than you did at this."

Both guards snapped out salutes, and Jeb turned and stalked away. However, once he cleared the corner, his thunderously angry expression was broken by a small, sly smile.

* * *

**128**

They were about ten feet down the hallway before Fang stopped and turned back.

"Fang?" Max asked, sounding confused.

He didn't answer, just went up to the door of the cell next to the one he had been in. "Does Jeb's card work on all of the cells?"

"Probably," she replied. "Fang, what are you doing?"

He just held his hand out toward where Max was standing.

She shook her head. "I'm not giving you that key until you tell me what you're doing! Who's in that cell?"

"You wouldn't like it," Fang told her.

She crossed her arms. "That doesn't mean you shouldn't tell me."

"It'd be easier if I didn't."

"So?" She raised her eyebrows pointedly, a silent challenge.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, then let it out all at once. Reopening his eyes, he said, "The Director is in that cell."

Max just stared at him for a minute. Then she exclaimed, "What the _hell_, Fang? The _Director_?"

"I know," he said. "But think about it. Now that Jeb's betrayed her, she's in a bad enough position that she'll help us just so she can get out too."

"No," she said flatly. "No way. I am _not_ working with the Director after everything she's done to us. How can you even be considering it?"

"We've been stuck in this place too long, Max," Fang said. "At this point there's not much I wouldn't do to get us out."

"But Fang, this is the _Director_," Max said, as if he wasn't already aware of that fact. "She's the _reason_ we've been stuck here for so long. She's the one who was behind all of the nasty things that happened to us."

"Ari," Fang said simply.

Max's brow furrowed in confusion. "What?"

"Ari," he repeated. "You wanted to take him, I didn't. Now it's reversed, and I happen to have an even better argument on my side than 'I feel bad for him and it wasn't really his fault anyway'."

"This is different," she said, glaring.

He nodded. "My point exactly."

"That doesn't even make–"

Max broke off, and Fang knew why. He had heard the sound of booted footsteps approaching as well. There were guards on their way, and he and Max had to get out of there before they arrived.

"Come on, Fang!" Max said angrily. "Just leave her there to rot."

"I'm not leaving without her," he replied. "We need the best chances we can get. I'm not going to fail another escape attempt."

Her eyes darted undecidedly between the open hallway and Fang, and after a moment's hesitation she threw him the key card.

"Don't make me regret this," she said.

He nodded, and opened the cell.

* * *

**A/N: So throughout the course of writing section 127, I managed to call Jeb 'Jbe', 'Jen', 'eb', and 'Keb'. If I were less apt at catching my typos, you might have had some good laughs at his expense.**


	31. Turmoil

**A/N: This first AN seems to be turning into the section for me to apologize profusely about how long it's taken me to update. This chapter is no exception. I'm very sorry. I meant to update _before_ I left home for two weeks so I could warn you all, but I didn't end up having time. I was at a two-week-long arts program where I was in a musical performance class and a lighting and sound design class and did many awesome things and had quite a lot of fun. Unfortunately, those many things didn't include finishing Pinch Me so that I could post regularly once I got home, so I'm probably going to go straight back into posting once every couple weeks. Again, sorry. We'll just make that the norm and if I update faster we can all be pleasantly surprised, 'kay?**

**Anyway, enjoy the chapter.**

**To xXjaziXx: You signed anonymously, so I have no idea who you are or if you'll be back and I can't PM you, but I very much enjoyed your review. It made me laugh. A lot. Also, you asked what my FP username was. If you'd gone to my profile, you would have located a link, but whatever. It's Kina Kalamari, just like on here. The stories are kind of old though, so don't expect too much. Thank you for reviewing. I hope you come back. =)**

* * *

**129**

"Where are the rest of the flock?" Max asked as they ran as quietly as they could through the cell block. "Are they in here, or did they get put somewhere else?"

Fang shrugged. Jeb had given each member of the flock to a different guard, and none of them had been together long enough to see anyone else's final destination.

"That's not useful," she said, frowning. Then she looked behind her. "Hurry up, will you? If they catch up to you, I'm not stopping."

The Director glared back, heaving deep breaths as she tried to keep up with the two much faster experiments. She hated the fact that she had ended up in this position, hated that she was reduced to "the expendable one who couldn't keep up". When she had talked with the male experiment in the cell, she had almost thought that she would get treated decently, despite everything she'd done. It had given her the smallest sensation of gratitude, something she had never in her life felt before.

It was gone. The female experiment was being just as unpleasant as she deserved to be, and the male one—Fang, the Director reminded herself—wasn't doing a thing to stop her.

Well, she was going to show them that she wasn't as expendable as they seemed to think she was.

"The rest of your group is here too," she said between breaths. "This is the only place to keep prisoners in the facility." She almost stopped running as she realized that she had more knowledge they could really use. The booted feet were still thundering in the halls behind them, however, so she slowed only slightly before pushing herself even more to catch up to the two figures ahead of her. "In fact, there are only ten soundproof cells in the entire cell block."

Fang glanced at her, paused, then stepped over to the nearest cell door and quickly opened it with the key card he was still holding.

"What are you doing?" Max asked him, her tone a mixture of confusion and panic. "She didn't say this one was one of them."

Fang just held the door open and pointed into the cell.

The Director got the idea and hurried in, but Max remained outside.

"I'm not going in there!" she said indignantly. "I'm claustrophobic!"

"No kidding," Fang said, "but we need to talk and we can't do it out here. You might want to get in there before the guys behind us catch up."

Max looked undecided for a minute, but then she warily stepped into the cell. Fang followed and shut the door behind them.

"Okay," Fang said into the darkness, "where are the soundproof cells?"

"Right next to the two we were in," the Director replied. "They're all together."

"You mean we have to turn around?" Max asked. "What about the fact that we're being chased?"

"The way the cells are set up," the Director told her, "we can get back there without backtracking at all."

"Or we can just stay in here until they pass," Fang said. "It worked last time."

"Which is exactly why it might not work this time," the Director interjected. "Jeb does learn from his mistakes sometimes, believe it or not."

"That wasn't his mistake," Max said. "That was _your_ mistake."

The Director scowled. "It was his mistake. I gave him the responsibility of catching you, and he failed. But either way, he may have given the guards better instructions this time."

"It doesn't matter now," Fang said. "They're too close."

The Director couldn't hear anything from outside the cell, but she trusted his enhanced hearing. "I guess we'll wait, then."

* * *

**130**

Iggy was almost glad of the dark loneliness of the soundproof cell. He didn't have to think about the things he couldn't see, didn't have to pretend that he was okay so the rest of the flock wouldn't worry about him. This was easier.

He slumped against the wall, his forehead resting on his knees. He wasn't tired physically, but emotionally he was exhausted. It was all too much, too quickly, and in too short of a time span. He hadn't had any time to sit down, relax, and try to sort things out, and now that he did, he found that he actually couldn't.

He got a family. He got his sight. He got Tess. He lost his family. He lost Tess. He lost his sight. Max got shot. They fought a large group of men much stronger than they were. They attempted escape. They got stuck in an elevator. They got caught. They got threatened. They got imprisoned.

When would it end?

There had been a time when Iggy wanted everything: his sight, a nice place to live, safety from the School, someone to love and who loved him… Now he just wanted some sort of reprieve from this constant madness. A small moment of peace. A soundproof cell wouldn't have been his ideal sanctuary, but if he could get his thoughts to calm down, he thought it might work.

But not if the door suddenly opened and Fang said, "Iggy. Good. Let's go."

Iggy felt like screaming.

"Go where?" he asked quietly, not moving.

"Out of here," Fang replied. There was a sound of light footsteps, and his next words were spoken from only a couple feet away. "You okay?"

Iggy just shrugged, his arms still around his head.

"Ig, we need to get going," Fang said.

"What's the point?" Iggy asked. "They caught us easily. I don't see how this time's going to be any different."

"This time we have the Director on our side," Fang said, "and I'm determined to get it right." He grabbed Iggy's arm and hauled him to his feet. "Come on."

Iggy blinked. "The Director?"

"Yeah."

"Is it a long story?"

"Longer than we have time for."

"Oh."

Fang headed for the door. Iggy paused for a long moment before following, but he knew that in the end, he would always go wherever the rest of the flock went. They were his real family, and being with them was better than being alone in a dark cell... In the long run.

* * *

**A/N: Sorry if it's somewhat shorter than usual. I have no excuse for that other than, "This seemed like a good place to end it."**

**I've certainly missed getting reviews while I've been gone. I look forward to seeing many of them stream into my inbox over the next week. =)**


	32. Thunder

**A/N: I have chapters written ahead! The plot just unfolded for me in the shower one morning, and BAM! Oh, I'm so excited. =D Currently, I have two chapters after this already written, so I'll post once a week with them and try to get more written in the meantime. Hopefully this will make up for the fact that I haven't posted in month. -sheepish smile-**

**Another note to xXjaziXx: Your story was very amusing. The fact that it took you three reviews to tell it was even more so. =P Thanks for coming back, and... I don't suppose you're planning on getting yourself an account? Then I could reply to your reviews normally...  
**

* * *

**131**

"That was the last one," Fang said, closing the cell door behind him, "and she wasn't in it."

He looked around at the other people who were standing in the hallway, looking worried. He and Max had gotten Iggy, Gazzy, Nudge, and the two scientists out of their cells, but Angel hadn't been in any of the ten soundproof ones.

Fang turned to the Director. "Where else would they have put her?"

"I don't know," she replied. "As far as I know, there's absolutely no reason for them to put her anywhere other than here."

"You're lying," Max snapped. "Tell us where she is."

The Director shook her head, holding up her hands in the gesture of surrender. "I know nothing. I'm not exactly on the team anymore, am I?"

Max glared at her and opened her mouth, but Fang held up his hand.

"Leave it, Max. Even if she does know something, we don't have time to force it out of her."

Max was silent for a moment, but then she nodded stiffly. "Okay. So since we have _nothing to go on_—" She glared at the Director. "—I don't know how we could possibly find Angel in anything close to a timely manner. I say we split into teams and try to put together an escape. We'll just have to hope that we can get Angel out when we go, somehow."

"What?" Nudge exclaimed. "What do you mean, 'Hope that we can get Angel out when we go'? What kind of a plan is that? Angel's part of the family, she always has been and she always will be, and we need to find her! They could be doing anything to her, and we're just going to let them? No!"

"Nudge," Fang said quietly, "I know. But we have nothing to go on."

"Needle in a haystack," Max added sadly.

Nudge opened and closed her mouth a few times, then crossed her arms and leaned against the wall, looking angry.

"I agree that we have to do something," Professor Henry said. "We can't leave Angel behind and get everyone else out."

"Alright," Max said, "how about you and the doctor go to the nearest lab and try to get some information out of the computer system. That should help. I'll go see if I can find a lone security guard and get some more keys off of him. Fang and Nudge can go back to the lab we were in before and grab some of those metal rods so we have weapons. Iggy and Gazzy can go on a quest for anything they can use to put a bomb together. Any problems with that plan?"

"Yeah," said the Director sourly, "what about me?"

Max looked at her, nose wrinkled ever so slightly. "I don't know. Go with the scientists, I guess. They won't be doing anything too dangerous."

"I don't think you should be going off on your own, Max," Fang said.

Max glared at him. "What, you think I can't handle myself? Because I can, and you know it."

"No," he said, "I just think that we should all have someone with us in case something happens."

"I'll be fine."

"You might not."

"I don't need help."

"That's not the point."

"I can—"

"Oh, for the love of… I'll go with her, alright?"

They both turned and look at the Director.

"No," Max said flatly. "No way."

"You think I _want_ to?" the Director asked. "I don't. But Fang's right; without someone to run back and get help, any of us could end up in deep shit."

"Fine," Max said past her clenched teeth. "Just don't expect me to get help if something happens to _you_."

* * *

**132**

_They're going to find me._

_**No they're not. You're going to be stuck here forever.**_

_They'll figure it out._

_**They'll never get that far.**_

_You don't know them like I do. They'll come get me._

_**I think you're drastically overestimating both your family's intelligence and their competence.**_

_No! They will come!_

…_I trust them._

* * *

**133**

Gazzy had no idea where they were going. He and Iggy were really just wandering through the halls of the School in search of anything useful, but all of the doors they had come to so far were locked, and they weren't making a whole lot of progress.

As he tried yet another door fruitlessly, he heard a weird rumbling noise that seemed to come from all around them.

"What was _that_?" he wondered out loud.

"Thunder," Iggy replied. "That's what it sounds like, anyway."

Gazzy frowned. "Thunder? Like, a thunderstorm? With lightning?"

"Yeah," Iggy said, shrugging. "Are we going to keep going?"

"Oh, right."

They moved on, Gazzy trying all of the doors they came to. None of them opened, and the rumbling continued sporadically.

"This is hopeless!" Gazzy exclaimed something like ten doors later. "Why did Max want us to do this? It's not like the doors are going to suddenly open or anything."

"I don't know," Iggy said. "You know Max, she has to pretend she has a plan even when she doesn't. I think she just wants us to feel like we might actually be doing something useful."

"Well, that didn't work out," Gazzy said, rattling the handle on the door next to him even though he already knew that it was locked. "I feel useless."

Iggy sighed, running his long fingers through his hair in a gesture that Gazzy realized he had missed during the last month. It was just so… Iggy. "Join the club."

"You're not useless," Gazzy protested. "You can hear better than any of the rest of us, and most of the time you don't even act like you can't see anything with the stuff you can do. I feel useless next to you, sometimes."

Iggy was silent for a long moment, then he smiled slightly. "Thanks, Gaz. I think I needed some perspective."

There was a loud CRACK, and all of the lights very suddenly went out.

"I think you were right about the thunder," Gazzy said, "and now I'm just as blind as you are."

"The power went out?"

"Yep."

A short pause. "That probably means there are no alarms. Gazzy, do these doors have glass windows in them?"

Gazzy leaned tentatively on the door's handle, then grinned. "Doesn't matter." Walking in, the first thing he noticed was that there was a vague red glow emanating from a large amount of small screens, numbers showing on all of them.

"Iggy, you're not going to believe what I'm looking at…"

* * *

**A/N: Stay tuned! Another chapter will be up at the beginning of next week. =)  
**


	33. Blackout

**A/N: I meant to post this yesterday, but alas, I am human and and therefore forget these things sometimes. I apologize. I hope you enjoy it anyway.  
**

* * *

**134**

Jeb was very angry. He had been forced to use a flashlight to get to the electric room. A _flashlight_.

"What is going on?" he roared, hoping that there were people in the darkness and that he wasn't shouting at nothing.

A flashlight beam came out of the black and shone straight into his eyes. "Ah. Hello, sir."

"Get that damned light out of my face!" The light moved down a foot or so. "Now answer my question."

"The power's gone out, sir," the man on the other end of the offending light replied.

"I AM AWARE OF THAT!" Jeb bellowed. "What about the backup generators?"

"They got sent back to the company on a recall."

Jeb experienced a moment of stunned silence. "They _what_?"

"Apparently some of that line had been experiencing problems that caused them to suddenly stop working, and in some cases even explode. So they got recalled. The new ones are due in next week."

"We don't have _any_ backup generators?"

"No, sir. Well, I believe the machines keeping the avian experiments out of action had their own generators because they would have tripped the breakers otherwise. But anything else that doesn't have its own batteries is down for the count."

"So we still have surveillance?"

"No, sir."

"But you said that anything with its own batteries—"

"The cameras have their own batteries. The monitors do not. So, yes, we still have surveillance, but you won't be able to view it until the power comes back on."

"DAMN IT!"

"I'm sorry, sir. I know this is inconvenient."

Inconvenient. What an incredible understatement.

* * *

**135**

"Um… Fang?"

"Yeah?"

"It's really dark…"

"Yes, Nudge."

"Do you know where you're going?"

"Not anymore."

"Oh."

There was a brief silence, but Fang knew that it wasn't going to last very long. Since the lights had gone out about five minutes ago, he had been trying to follow a path that he'd only been down once, with no visible proof that he was going the right way. There was a very large possibility that he had completely missed a crucial side hallway and that he and Nudge were now just wandering aimlessly around some other section of the School.

"So if we don't know how to get to the lab or back to where the others were, what are going to do? Do you think we should just stay here and wait for the lights to come back on?"

"Definitely not."

"Why?"

"Because we have the advantage right now. Jeb has no way of knowing where we are, and I'm sure he's too busy trying to fix this to look."

"That makes sense, I guess, but I don't really get how we have an advantage if we don't know where we are either."

Fang's right hand stopped running along the wall, instead feeling empty air. A hallway. "Trust me, Nudge. This is a good thing. Turn right."

They continued on like that for a while, but even without any light, Fang soon realized that he was nowhere that he'd ever been before.

"Damn," he muttered, leaning his forehead against the wall.

"Are we lost? I told you we were going to get lost, but no one really listens to me."

_**Fang.**_

He jerked upright. What the hell was that?

_Hello?_

_**FANG!**_

_Yeah…_

_**It's Angel. Can you get me out?**_

"Fang?" Nudge's voice came out of the darkness, sounding a little annoyed. "I was right, no one listens to me."

"Sorry, Nudge. Angel just thought at me."

"Angel?" Nudge exclaimed, all annoyance gone. "Where is she?"

"I don't know."

_Angel, where are you?_

_**I don't know. Your thoughts are coming from the leftish, though. **_

_Are you facing the door of the room you're in?_

_**I think so.**_

"Okay," he said, "we're going to head down the hall some more until we find a door."

As it turned out, they weren't that far away from one. Fang stopped in front of it.

_Am I still coming from the left?_

_**Um… A little.**_

"Not this one," he said.

There was another door about twenty feet away.

_Now?_

_**You're straight ahead!**_

"It's this one." He tried the handle, not expecting it to open.

It did.

"How are we going to get the door open? They lock their doors, right? And they're really strong so we can't just—"

"Nudge, it's open."

"It is?"

"Yeah. Guess it needs a source of power to stay locked. Electro-magnetic, or something."

"Wow, Fang. You're so smart."

He pushed the door open and stepped into the room. "Nah, I just read stuff. Angel, you in here?"

_**Uh-huh… But there's something over my mouth.**_

"I can't see anything. What is this room, d'you think? Why would they put Angel in here and not in one of the cells where we were? Were they doing tests on her or—"

"No idea. Help me find Angel. She says she's gagged."

"They gagged her? That's horrible! I bet they _were_ doing tests. Don't you think that seems like something they'd do if they were doing nasty stuff? I really hope she's okay. Does she sound like she's in pain? Is she–… Ow!"

"Nudge?"

There was small pause, which caused Fang to momentarily panic. The fact that it was completely dark was only increasing his ingrained paranoia, and he couldn't help but picture all the horrible things that could have happened to Nudge to make her stop replying.

But then she said, "I bumped into something. A table, I think. I really want a light, Fang."

"I know. Me too."

"Ooh, I bumped into something else!"

Fang raised an eyebrow. "Why do you sound excited about that one?"

"Because it's Angel! Follow my voice… And watch out for the table."

* * *

**A/N: And, because I am awesome, there is another chapter prepared that shall be posted at the beginning of next week. =)**

**Review, per favore!  
**


	34. Lights

**A/N: I'm catching up to the chapters that I have prewritten. This is the last complete one. =\ I _will_ finish thirty-five before next week, though. I'm promising in a way that cannot be unpromised so that if I don't manage it, you can all have undisputed rights to flame me. This is my motivation. I hope it works.  
**

* * *

**136**

As soon as the lights went out, Professor Henry knew that his and the doctor's job had just been made entirely impossible.

After a few minutes of darkness, Doctor Jones said, "Aren't the backup generators supposed to start up about now?"

"Yes," the professor replied. "Something must be wrong with them. Looks like we're stuck in the dark. Luckily, I believe we were standing right next to a janitor's cart."

"Luckily because…?"

Professor Henry made his way carefully to where he remembered the cart being and grabbed a… Snapple bottle? Shaking his head, he set the bottle back down and grabbed the other cylindrical object on the cart. He clicked it on, and the hallway lit up.

"Luckily," he said, "because they're much more likely to have flashlights than we are."

"Very useful," the doctor agreed. There was a pause, and then he said, "So we have light… Now what do we do?"

The professor scratched his forehead absently, frowning. "I don't know. I'm sure the flock is still working on getting out. This is more good luck than they could have hoped for. I say we do something that might be helpful."

"Any thoughts?"

"Traveling back in time and distributing flashlights might be useful," the professor suggested wryly. "In all seriousness, though, I feel like we should go to the electric room. There are probably people there, but I'd really like to know what's still running, if anything is."

Doctor Jones nodded. "To the electric room, it is."

* * *

**137**

The Director couldn't keep up with the avian experiments in the most favorable of situations, and when the lights went out, she had no chance whatsoever.

"I'm not waiting," Max snapped. "You're slowing me down even more than you were before."

"I have a miniature flashlight," the Director retorted. "Do you have one of those?"

Max snorted. "A miniature flashlight? Really? That in no way makes you useful."

"You'd be surprised," the Director said coldly. "There aren't any windows, and all of our lights are hooked up to the main power. So unless you can find a flashlight, even you are blind."

"Fine, whatever. Hand it over."

"Not a chance."

Max growled. "I can't deal with you right now. I don't have time."

The Director crossed her arms, even though she knew Max couldn't see it. "That doesn't mean you're getting rid of me."

"Gosh," Max said scathingly, "you sound like you don't want us to escape."

"I don't," the Director returned. "I do, however, want _me_ to escape. Helping you suits my purposes."

"Guess what?" Max said. "I don't think letting you help us suits our purposes anymore."

The flashlight was suddenly ripped out of the Director's hand, and a fist smashed into the side of her head. She went down, pain exploding through her skull.

She heard Max's footstep retreat down the hall, and then she blacked out for the first time in her life.

* * *

**138**

Angel had been tied to the leg of the table that Nudge had run into, gagged and immobilized. They tried to untie her, but in the dark it was almost impossible. The most they could do was pull the cloth away from her mouth so that she could speak.

"We need light," Fang muttered, leaning back on his heels.

There was a slight scuffing noise from beside him that sounded like Nudge standing up. It was followed by clatters and rustles from above him.

"I think I was right, Fang," she said, her voice echoing around the room. "All of this stuff feels like stuff they would have in an operating room. There's a tray of metal tools or something here. Like, dentist stuff. Oh, wait, this one's plastic."

"Try to find a button on it," Fang told her. "Could be a surgical penlight."

A second later a small white light leaked through the darkness.

"Yes!" Nudge exclaimed. "This is so awesome!" She made her way back around the table and kneeled down next to Fang. "Here, see if you can untie them now."

The light turned an only-by-a-really-lucky-finger-slip-can-this-possibly-be-done task into something incredibly easy. Whoever had tied them obviously knew only the very basics of knot-tying. The extent of their lessons had probably been, "And when you cross the two ears over each other and pull them, you make a double-knot. There you go, Jimmy, now your sneakers won't fall off." It had only stumped Fang's knowledgeable fingers in the dark because the cord was particularly thin.

"Thank you," Angel said, once she was free of her bonds. "That was really uncomfortable."

"Do you know why they put you in here?" Fang asked.

"Were they testing you?" Nudge added. "Operating and stuff?"

Angel shook her head, looking pale and bony in the weak light of the penlight. "They just tied me up here. I don't know why they didn't put me where they put you guys."

That didn't make sense. Fang was starting to get the feeling that Jeb had some other plan going than just "Kill the mutants". If that was all he wanted to do, he could have done it already.

"Let's go, you two," he said, not voicing his thoughts. "We still have a job to do."

"We do?" Angel asked.

Nudge explained as they left the room, lowering her voice when the stepped into the hall and it started bouncing back at her. They headed through the halls again, a little less blindly now that they had a light source. Fang still didn't know if they were going the right way, but he felt a little less claustrophobic without the darkness pressing on him quite as tightly as it had been.

They had been walking for about five minutes when Angel stopped, frowning.

"What is it, Ange?" Fang asked.

"I… I'm not sure," she replied. "It sounds like…" She trailed off.

"I don't hear anything," Nudge said. "Do you mean you hear it in your head? Someone's thoughts or something?"

Angel nodded. Then she said, slowly, "It sounds like… Max. But there's something wrong with her."

It took all of Fang's will not to show Nudge and Angel any trace of the panicked chill that ran through him when he heard that.

"Where is she?" he demanded.

Whatever was wrong with her had better not be serious, or someone was going to pay.

* * *

**A/N: So I've had an idea. I don't much like the current summary of this story, and since I can only occasionally manage good ones myself, I thought I would hold a summary-writing contest. I don't know if I have enough readers for this to work, but I've never done anything like it and I want to try it. **

**As most of you probably know, summaries must be 255 characters or less. You can check whether you're within the limit either by using a word processing program (the "with spaces" count) or pretending like you're going to post a story and just using the actual summary box on FFN. An idea of what might strike my fancy: well-worded, capturing a good gist of what the story is about, and preferably humorous in some way. (It would be nice if the "AU continuation from chapter 41 of STWAOES could still fit, but if the summary is good enough, I'll take that out.)  
**

**Disclaimer: Because I don't know how well this is going to go, I would just like to say that I reserve the right to not use any of the summaries. I'm not trying to be rude, just realistic. Also, I will only credit the person who wrote any summary that I do end up using if there is still space within the 255 characters **_**and**_** they want me to. If it doesn't fit but they really want me to, I can add it to the first chapter of the story as an edit.**

**Okay, so I'll take summary ideas either in review or in a PM somehow titled to tell me that's what it is. The contest will be open until September 2****nd****, and then I'll announce the winner, if there is one, when I post chapter 36 (which I will hopefully have written by that point). **

**Good luck!**


	35. Curveball

**A/N: I am an updating _machine_! I can't believe I'm still pulling off this once a week thing. Don't get too comfortable; I may very well suddenly stop being so prompt.**

**EDIT: I just noticed that I passed two hundred reviews with the last chapter. Thanks, guys! =D  
**

* * *

**139**

They followed Angel down the hall and around a couple of corners, until she finally stopped in front of a door that looked pretty much the same as every other door they'd passed.

"She's in here," she told Fang and Nudge.

Fang closed his eyes briefly, pushing all of his panic down until he knew that he could be calm and rational no matter what was behind the door. If he freaked out at all, the situation would become ten times worse for Nudge and Angel, and he wasn't going to let that happen.

Then he pushed the door open and shone the tiny little penlight into the room.

Fang's first thought was that somehow, they'd made it back to the lab. The room was almost the same size and set up in a very similar manner. But he knew that they hadn't gone up any stairs, and upon closer inspection, there were noticeable differences. The one thing that was most certainly not different was the fact that there were six beds sitting against the back wall.

"Fang, is this—?"

"No." He moved across the room, the penlight held out in front of him.

"Fang?"

"What, Nudge?"

"You look like Harry Potter."

Fang looked at the glowing penlight in his hand, then turned to glare at Nudge. "Not the time."

"She's over there, Fang," Angel said, pointing to the right of where he was heading. "I think she's on the last bed."

He nodded and turned that direction. All of this was just catching up to him, and he was beginning to wonder how it had happened. Where was the Director? Was this her fault? He knew he was being an idiot when he decided to trust her, but he did it anyway. He really should have taken Max's advice and left the Director in that cell.

He approached the figure lying on the bed that Angel had indicated.

He stared at the figure lying on the bed that Angel had indicated.

"…Angel?"

"What?"

"Are you _sure_ this is the right bed?"

Angel walked up to the other side of the bed. She was too short to see much, but she could see enough to know what the problem was.

"Uh-oh."

"Why 'uh-oh'?" Nudge asked. "What's going—" She stopped as she came up to the end of the bed. "Oh. Oh my _God_. Angel, what the heck?"

"I… I don't know," Angel said hesitantly. "I can hear her. This is right."

Fang couldn't believe what he was seeing. Swears rang through his head as he stared blankly down at the Whitecoat lying on the bed.

"Explain," he told Angel.

Angel closed her eyes, then opened them again, her expression helpless. "I can't. I just know that Max is in there."

What the hell was going on? Fang's mind was reeling over the realization that if this was what they thought it was, then he had been tricked, _yet again_, into believing that someone who was not Max was in fact Max. How could he not notice? _How?_

He moved up to the head of the bed, and was mildly relieved to find cables and a monitor like the ones they had been hooked up to in the old lab. He had no idea how it was still running, considering that nothing else was getting any power, but it at least proved that it wasn't some creepy new thing that could possibly be permanent. If they could turn it off or unhook it, they could reverse this catastrophe.

"Okay, I don't know what's going on," he said, "but we're going to fix it. Help me find an off button."

* * *

**140**

The two scientists stood outside the door to the electric room, Doctor Jones fiddling nervously with the pocket of his lab coat, Professor Henry resolutely steeling himself.

Doctor Jones seemed to realize that he was fidgeting and let go of his coat with a sigh. "So what are we going to do if there are guards in there?"

"I'm not precisely sure yet," the professor replied, "but my hopes are that it won't include screaming like prepubescent girls or getting ourselves captured for a third time."

The doctor nodded vaguely. "An excellent plan."

Before either of them could change their minds, Professor Henry pushed open the door.

The room on the other side was just as dark as the hallways had been. There were no security guards waiting to pounce on the first traitor-scientists that happened to walk in, there was no Jeb smiling unpleasantly.

"Amazing," Professor Henry said. "I think we may have actually gotten lucky this time."

But of course, the universe couldn't actually be cutting them a break, could it?

"Hello?" asked a voice from across the room, echoing strangely around the many boxes and cables and strange devices that, under normal circumstances, buzzed so loudly that you wouldn't have been able to hear much of anything through the noise. "Who's there?"

Professor Henry had a sudden confusion of thoughts of running, hiding, or bashing whoever it was over the head with his aluminum flashlight. He had so many conflicting thoughts, in fact, that he just ended up standing uselessly where he was. Doctor Jones must not have been much better off, because he made no move either.

Another beam of light showed up around the corner of the large metal box that was located next to the door, and as the owner of the unknown voice grew closer, the professor recognized him as the electrician.

Because that wasn't at all to be expected, the electrician actually being in the electric room during a power outage.

"Er… Hi," said the professor. "How are things going in here?"

The electrician shrugged. "Not particularly well. Professor Henry, right? And… Doctor Jones?"

Oh, no. Not good. But surprisingly, the electrician sounded perfectly friendly. Was it possible that the news hadn't made it all the way around yet?

"Yes," Professor Henry said, hoping that they weren't about to be hauled back to the cells. "I'm sorry, but I can't seem to recall your name."

"No problem," the electrician said, smiling good-naturedly. "Not many people remember the tech guys. I'm Dave. Dave Mitchell. I take it you want to know what the power situation is?"

The professor nodded, hardly daring to believe that they had escaped certain doom. "If you could be so kind."

Dave gestured for them to follow him as he turned and headed back around the large metal box. "So basically, everything's shut down." He stopped at the bank of fuse boxes and shrugged helplessly. "Nothing. The back-up generators were recalled—Jeb wasn't pleased about that—and we've got nothing else. Until the power company gets around to fixing the lines, we're powerless."

Doctor Jones pointed toward a group of small green lights coming from something that looked like a control panel. "So what are those?"

Dave glanced over. "Oh, those are the generators that the machines for the bird experiments are hooked up to. They took so much power that they would have tripped the breakers if we'd hooked them up to the main system, so we had to get them something else."

"And those weren't recalled?" Professor Henry asked.

"Nope," Dave said. "Different model, apparently less prone to spontaneous combustion."

The professor counted the lights. "Why are there twelve of them?"

"Six for the old fantasy-world-inducing machines, six for the new body/mind-switch machine thingers." Dave shrugged. "I don't pretend to know what the hell this new technology does, I just make sure it all gets enough power."

Professor Henry had no idea what the "body/mind-switch machine thingers" were, but he was guessing that they had to do with the flock and that they were bad. "So… Are they hooked up in here or would you have to go find them to turn them on and off?"

"They're all hooked up to a master switch," Dave said, pointing to the panel. "It's right on there. Just in case anything goes wonky and we need to do an emergency shutdown."

"Fantastic." Professor Henry walked over to the panel and pulled the switch labeled "POWER" down to the off position. There was no _zhoomph_ noise like you tend to hear in the movies when large things power down, all of the little green lights just went dark.

Dave gaped at him. "But… What are you… I really don't think…" He stopped, shook his head, then said simply, "Jeb is going to kill you."

"He was going to anyway," Doctor Jones said. "Now are you going to tell anyone, or do we need to find something heavy to hit you over the head with?"

Dave just shook his head mutely.

Doctor Jones looked at Professor Henry, a question in his eyes. The professor shrugged. Then he saw the radio sitting on the desk nearby. He picked it up, popped open the back, and removed the batteries. He tossed the radio back onto the desk and slipped the batteries into his coat pocket.

"That'll be enough, I think," he said, with a meaningful look at Dave. "I really don't like taking drastic measures."

Dave gulped and nodded at nothing in particular.

His day had just gone from bad to worse.

* * *

**A/N: BAM! So who saw that Max thing coming? I think only one person even had any clue that something was off, as far as reviews went. I feel pretty impressive for pulling it off. \m/^_^\m/ (Me? Full of myself? Whyever would you think **_**that**_**? O_o)**

**Anyway, there's still another week for the summary contest, so if you haven't sent me one yet, you've still got time. Hell, even if you have already sent me one, feel free to send more if you've got more ideas. This contest is more about me getting a summary than it is about any participant fairness. =P**


	36. Consciousness

**A/N: So, the results are in! Summary contest is over, and I got loads of great suggestions. Thanks much. And the winner is... (a drum roll would be appropriate here, if anyone has a drum, because despite jumping through the hoops my parents demanded, I still don't have a drum kit) ...StephanieZorander! I shall post it here in case anyone doesn't feel like going elsewhere to look.**

**"The flock has been trapped in an illusion for the past four years. With unlikely allies, a familiar foe, and a couple bottles of Snapple, can the flock escape from their life-long prison? AU continuation from Ch. 41 of STWAOES."**

**Yes, it's possible that I picked it simply because of the Snapple mention. =P And, because it made me laugh, a special mention for 4233!**

**"In this AU continuation of Chapter 41 of STWAOES, Max and the Flock discover what happens when mad scientists get obsessed with 'The Matrix'. Intrigued? Good! Disclaimer: I am not trying to insinuate, or insinuating, that Kina Kalamari is a plagiarist. I'm just thinking up a possible backstory to this whole thing. Kapiche?"**

**Well played, 4233, well played. And honestly, if it hadn't been for the Snapple thing, I don't know what I would have done. They were all great. Thank you again.  
**

* * *

**141**

I was standing in a dark hall, holding a miniature flashlight, with absolutely no idea where I was or what the hell was going on. My brain was fuzzy, not allowing me to remember much of anything past getting stuck in an elevator.

I smacked my forehead with the palm of the hand that wasn't holding the flashlight. I knew there was more, I knew it. Logically, I also knew that smacking myself wasn't going to help me remember, but I had always been a "Hit first, ask questions later" kind of girl, and that applied even to myself.

I know, I'm messed up.

A vague memory darted into the periphery of my mind. I narrowed my eyes as I tried to catch it. Something about… Jeb.

But that was all I could get. Jeb had done something, but I still had no idea what. Or how I had ended up where I was.

I shone the little flashlight around. The hall could have been any of the halls in the School. White tiled floor, white walls… They seriously needed an interior decorator.

Sighing, I turned around and headed the opposite direction of where I'd been facing when I'd suddenly come to. I had never been in a situation like this, but I already knew that I hated it. I had no information whatsoever. Where was the rest of the flock? How was I supposed to find them? Why was it so freaking dark? Where did I get a flashlight? What was I going to—

My mental questions were cut off as I stumbled over something and was only saved from falling on my face by my superhuman agility.

I frowned and shone the light down at the floor, illuminating the…

Holy (insert-the-swear-word-that-every-one-of-you-will-automatically-insert here).

The Director was lying in an unconscious heap on the floor.

I squatted down next to her, trying to figure out what was wrong with her without actually touching her. There were no obvious signs of damage, so I figured that she had either fainted or been hit over the head with something. I was assuming the latter, because the Director didn't really seem like the fainting type.

Had I done this?

I sat back in shock as the thought ran through my mind, almost without me really thinking it. Was it possible that something had happened to make me do things without being aware of them? Maybe that was why I couldn't remember anything.

I didn't want to wake the Director up, but I didn't want to go stumbling around in the dark halls of the School until I happened across something either. The chance of whatever I stumbled across being bad, knowing my luck, would far outweigh the chance of it being good. And there was the chance that I would never stumble across anything. That would almost be worse.

Knowing that it was a bad idea, I dragged the Director over to the nearest wall and sat her upright against it. Then I knelt down in front of her, wondering how I could wake her up. If she had been knocked unconscious, slapping her awake wasn't going to work. Maybe if I had a bucket of water…

I shone the flashlight around. No janitor's cart.

Oh, hey. _Flashlight._ I'm so smart sometimes.

I pushed one of the Director's eyelids up with my thumb and flashed the little light back and forth in front of her face. I saw a flicker of consciousness.

I kept at it.

* * *

**142**

They hadn't been able to find any sort of power button or switch, and Fang was wary of pushing any buttons that they weren't sure about. But as it turned out, they didn't need to do anything.

The machine turned off by itself.

"What the…" Fang stared disbelievingly at the screen that had just gone dark. Since when did things turn themselves off at random?

"Fang?" came Nudge's voice from a few feet away, the tone asking him to explain.

He couldn't explain. He had no more knowledge than she did.

"She's waking up," Angel said. It took Fang a couple of seconds to realize that she was talking about the Whitecoat.

Fang checked to make sure that she was strapped down, and then they waited for her to wake up.

She came to violently, twitching at first and then thrashing as much as she could with her arms and legs held in place. Fang wasn't sure if that was normal for her or if the machine was causing it, but unless it had a similar effect on Max, he didn't really care.

After a few moments of flailing, her eyes opened and her limbs calmed down. As soon as she looked like she was mostly lucid, Fang moved the penlight in front of her face and said, "What's going on?"

She blinked slowly, her pupils contracting. "That depends on who you are."

"I'm someone who wants information," he said. "What exactly does this machine do?"

"Why the hell would I tell you that? If you don't already know, you're obviously not someone who should know."

Her logic seemed to have survived her rough awakening. Luckily, they didn't actually need her to tell them.

"It does what you thought, Fang," Angel said. "She was in Max's body and Max was stuck in here."

The woman on the bed looked over to where Angel was standing, her eyes narrowing. "You," she hissed. "Impertinent brat."

Angel looked startled, but then she frowned. "You're the one who took away my memories. You weren't very nice."

Fang looked between them, then turned back to the Whitecoat, even angrier with her now that he knew she was responsible for something else. "Did Jeb do this?"

"Of course Jeb did this."

That didn't make any sense. Jeb had had them locked up, pretty much entirely unable to escape. He could have just killed them, but instead he had switched Max for someone else and had the imposter _let them out_. What the hell was he planning?

"Why?"

"How would I know?" she asked scornfully. "_I_ can't read minds."

Fang had been planning to interrogate the Whitecoat until she answered every question he had, but now all he wanted to do was find Max. It was a powerful, irrational, and insane urge that he almost thought he wouldn't be able to control; his mind was half-convinced that his body was going to say "To hell with this" and run off without permission, but of course his mind wasn't really that much of a pushover.

Still, the Whitecoat didn't seem to be particularly eager to help, and there wasn't that much that they really needed to know. She'd answered the one question that was really important.

"Okay, guys," he said, barely stopping his hand from twitching due to the weird, burning "move" feeling in his limbs, "let's split. We have better things to do."

Angel smiled, her eyes twinkling with knowledge that, in Fang's opinion, she really shouldn't have.

Damn mind readers.

"Don't be mad, Fang," she said in her all-too-sweet little voice. "Besides, I think it's romantic."

Nudge's eyes widened. "Romantic? What's romantic? What are you talking about, Angel?" She paused, a grin appearing on her face. "Ooh, were you reading Fang's thoughts again? Was he thinking about Max?"

"Shut up, both of you," Fang growled. "Let's go."

"Is the widdle bird-boy in wove?" asked the Whitecoat snidely. "That's sickeningly unpleasant."

In answer, Fang grabbed a nearby metal try that was full of surgical instruments and slammed it down over the Whitecoat's cranium. Then he threw the dented tray at the wall and headed for the door.

Over the clatter of the instruments settling into their new homes on the floor and the clang of the tray bouncing onto the counter, he heard Nudge say to Angel, "Does he seem touchier than usual to you?"

* * *

**A/N: I may not get the next chapter up in a week. It's not written yet, so I can't make any promises. I'm just happy I made it this long with frequent updates. =)  
**


	37. Cut

**A/N: See? I told you I couldn't keep up the once a week thing. -sigh- I do actually have an excuse this time, though; my parents are getting divorced and my house has been kinda crazy for the past few weeks. All the same, I apologize. **

**On the bright side, I'm fairly certain that there are only going to be a few more chapters of this fic ("few" being an extremely loose estimate; I'm not known for my accurate predictions of these sorts of things), and then you won't have to deal with my horrible updating skills anymore.**

**Oh, and a shout-out to xXjaziXx for giving me possibly the longest review I have ever received in the history of my posting on FFN, and certainly the longest review I've ever received that had that little to do with the story it was addressing. Thanks for the entertainment, and thank you for making yourself an account so that I wasn't forced to reply to the whole thing right here. =P**

* * *

**143**

"Where am I?" I asked the Director for something like the fifth time. So far I'd just gotten vague mumbling in reply. Apparently it takes a minute for people to become coherent after being forcefully woken from unconsciousness.

I sighed and sat back on my heels to wait.

Finally, her eyes focused on me. Her brows furrowed, but I couldn't tell if that was due to confusion or anger. "Max?"

"Yep," I said, a little surprised that she was referring to me by name. "I need information, and you're going to give it to me."

"Why should I do that?" she asked, and it became clear that she was angry. "You knocked me out. I knew I shouldn't trust you, but I did, and look where it got me. You're nothing but overgrown, rebellious lab rats, and you should all be shot."

I had been expecting something like this, but there was one part of her rant that was off. "Hang on… You were trusting me? Why?"

"I don't know," she spat. "Maybe because I had a momentary lapse of any common sense at _all_." She paused. "Why do you sound like you don't know what happened?"

I smiled grimly. "Because I don't. I don't know where I am, I don't know where the rest of my flock is, I don't remember knocking you out, I don't know why there are no lights on… I don't know anything right now."

"Your ploys are getting weirder," she said, "but I'm not falling for it."

"_My_ ploys?" I asked indignantly. "This obviously has something to with you and your 'let's debilitate and kill them all' craziness. I didn't just lose my freaking memory for no reason. Something happened to me."

She opened her mouth like she was going to argue, but then she closed it abruptly. She had—for lack of a better description—light-bulb-face.

"What?" I said.

"Jeb," she replied. "Jeb did something."

I raised my eyebrows. "And you don't know what it is? I don't believe that."

"Jeb took over and locked me in a cell, most likely with plans to kill me," she snapped. "He hasn't told me _anything_."

Wow. I was really behind on the news. "So… If Jeb locked you up, does that mean that… we let you go?"

"Yes. Your boyfriend decided to let me help you in return for freeing me."

"He's not my boyfriend," I said automatically, but my mind was going through possible scenarios in which Fang would make any sort of deal with the Director. We must have been in worse trouble than I had thought.

"Then you must be in denial," she said, "because that ex–… _Fang_ is in love with you."

"How the hell would _you_ know that?" I asked, irritated. "It's not like you even have any human emotions, you creep."

She scowled. "You didn't see his face when he found out that you had survived that bullet. It would take a robot to not recognize that kind of love."

My heart had a brief battle with my head, and as per usual, my head won. Not with the overwhelming victory it usually had, but it still won. "Whatever. Do you know where they are?"

* * *

**144**

"Remote activation!" Gazzy exclaimed, feeling triumphant.

But Iggy just shook his head. "Using what? We don't have any of the supplies for that."

"So what are we supposed to do?" Gazzy asked. "Turn it on now and hope for the best?"

"I think it might be the only option," Iggy replied, his brow furrowed. "We gave it an hour, right? That should be enough time."

Gazzy knew that things that "should" work always failed you when you really needed them, but he had to agree that it was probably their only option. Even if he didn't like it.

"Okay," he said. "Let's do it."

He took a deep breath and cut the blue wire.

As all of the numbers started ticking back from sixty, he pressed a button on the watchlike gadget he had rigged up for himself. Then he grabbed the huge, two-foot-long flashlight he'd found under one of the desks.

"Come on," he said to Iggy as he headed for the door at a jog. "We have to find the others."

* * *

**145**

Fang, Nudge, and Angel had almost made it back to the cell block when Iggy and Gazzy barreled out of a side hallway and almost knocked all three of them over.

"Oh, hi guys," Gazzy said. He looked anxious and a little out of breath.

"Hey," Fang replied. "Going somewhere?"

"Trying to find you, actually," Iggy said. "We have to get out of here. Soon."

Fang heard the meaningful note in Iggy's voice, and was immediately wary. "Why?"

"Oh, nothing important," Iggy said nonchalantly. "We just rigged up, oh… maybe fifty bombs to blow up in…" He looked toward Gazzy, who held up his wrist.

Glowing green numbers announced, "00:57:28."

"You couldn't wait until we knew how to leave before you did that?" Fang asked angrily. "Let's go. We have to find Max."

"And then we have to find Angel," Gazzy said. "I really hope we can find her before—"

"Gazzy," Angel said, stepping out from where she'd been hidden behind Nudge, "I'm here."

"Angel!"

Angel smiled. "Hi."

"Okay, never mind," Gazzy said, looking like he'd just gotten an unexpectedly awesome birthday present. "We just need to find Max."

Fang rolled his eyes. "Yes. Let's _go._"

"Don't mess with him," Nudge advised the others. "You should've seen what he did to the Whitecoat who picked on him. I bet she's going to have a headache for, like, ever."

Gazzy turned to stare wide-eyed at Fang, and Iggy raised his eyebrows.

"Ignore her," Fang told them. "Can we get going?" He didn't wait for an answer, just turned and started walking down the hall.

"Like a wet cat," Iggy commented as they followed.

Fang ignored him.

* * *

**A/N: I'm not even going to try to make any promises about the ETA of the next chapter, but please don't give up on me! I still love this story and all of its readers, and I would be very disappointed to lose either. I _will_ finish it, that I can promise.**


	38. Blow

**A/N: I can't apologize enough for the huge delay in the posting of this chapter. You see, I've had it mostly written for over a month now. I wrote all but the last few paragraphs at the end of October, and then started NaNoWriMo and didn't get a chance to finish writing it. So now NaNo's over (I won, if anyone's curious), and I finally managed to write those last hundred or so words.**

**So again, sorry, but it wasn't without reason. And my sister helped me brainstorm up a good ending, so it should be downhill from here. =)**

* * *

**146**

The Director had led me through the halls of the School for at least fifteen minutes before we had finally arrived somewhere I recognized. The cell block.

I shone the flashlight around, not seeing anything.

"Are they locked up?" I asked.

The Director shook her head. "I don't think they're here. This is the last place I saw them before we split up."

I turned on her, frowning. "You mean you don't actually know where they are? Why the hell did you act like you did, then?"

"I didn't," she replied emotionlessly, not bothering to elaborate.

Damn her. Apparently deigning to work with us didn't necessarily mean she was going to be pleasant about it, or even particularly useful. What was I supposed to do now? Stand around and hope they came back?

Before I had time to really get frustrated, I saw a light appear and begin to grow at the end of one of the halls that branched off of the cell block. It was immediately clear that this light was much larger than my tiny flashlight.

"Crap," I muttered, going into danger mode. I turned to the Director. "Where can we hide?"

She glanced around, then shrugged. I contemplated punching her, but then she said, "In a cell? It might work again, even though you've done it about ten times already."

It was true that Jeb would think to check in the cells, but he didn't know where we were. If we weren't spotted before we got into the cell, we might have a better chance.

"Only chance we've got," I said, and ran over to the nearest cell. The Director and I hid, the door to the cell open just enough for me to see.

My caution turned out to be unnecessary. The people coming up the hall were as much Jeb or guards as I was a chimpanzee. As soon as I saw my flock, I opened the cell door and stepped out.

When the Director had told me her opinion on my relationship with Fang, she had forced a new perspective on me whether I wanted to accept it or not. As soon as I saw him, I started looking for signs that she was right. I found one, too. The expression in his eyes when he looked at me was enough to prove it. He loved me. And judging by the flip my stomach did at the realization, some part of me liked the idea.

I closed my eyes, trying to shove all of the emotional stuff back behind the more urgent things that I should have been focusing on. I only half succeeded, but it was enough.

"Hey, Max," Fang said once they reached me, and I opened my eyes to see him looking at me, his mouth quirked into a half-smile. "We were looking for you."

"Fancy that," I replied, grinning despite myself. "I was looking for you, too."

His smile dropped away, and he looked at me more seriously. "Are you okay?"

I shrugged, wondering if he knew what he was asking. "Mostly. Definitely better now than I was half an hour ago. Though honestly, I don't actually know how I was a half hour ago. I'm just guessing about that."

"What do you mean?" he asked, a barely-noticeable line appearing between his eyebrows.

I shrugged again. "I woke up in a random hall somewhere, alone, in the dark, with no recollection of anything since we got stuck in the elevator. It's a good thing I found her—" I jabbed my thumb at the Director, who was standing behind me. "—or I probably would still be lost."

"Would it help if I told you that you were stuck in a Whitecoat's body while her mind inhabited yours?"

My eyebrows shot up. "_What_?"

He explained what they had found, with me staring at him incredulously the whole time.

"That's just messed up," I said.

He nodded curtly, and I saw anger spark in his eyes. I could understand. I was angry too, and sick of being used like this.

"Fang?" Gazzy said, his expression anxious.

"Oh, right," Fang said. "We should go."

I looked between them, bewildered. "Go where? What's going on?"

Iggy smiled in a way that could only be described as devilish. "You'll like it, Max. We're going to blow the place in…" He gestured toward Gazzy, who held up his wrist.

00:49:36

"Oh, dear unknown deity," I breathed. "Bombs? In less than an hour?"

Iggy and Gazzy nodded simultaneously.

"WHAT?" the Director shrieked. "Are you saying you're going to blow everything up? All of my hard work? Everything I've ever achieved in my life? You're going to _blow it up_?"

"Yep," Iggy confirmed. "Hope you keep a backup on the 'Net somewhere."

The Director was beginning to turn colors. "After all I've done for you. I can't believe this!"

I raised a skeptical eyebrow. "After all you've done _to_ us, you mean?"

"I'm helping you escape!" she yelled. "I'm saving your sorry asses!"

"That's nowhere near enough to make up for fifteen years of misery," I told her. "Besides, none of this was yours anymore anyway. Jeb took it. And if you don't stop shouting, someone's going to hear us and capture us, and we're going to be stuck in here when it explodes." I turned to Fang. "What's the plan?"

He shrugged. "We don't have one."

"Find an exit?" Iggy offered. "Just a thought, but it seems like it might be a good idea."

"Okay," I said to the Director, "either you lead us to a door or you go down with your building and all of your work."

Her glare was immeasurably angry, and if I hadn't been the tough cookie that I was, I might have been a little bit intimidated. "So I really only have one choice."

I shook my head in denial of her statement. "I gave you two, and I'm sure you could come up with more if you wanted to get creative."

She turned around and stalked toward one of the halls. "The closest door is this way."

I grinned at Fang, who gave me a quirk of his mouth in response, and then we followed our worst enemy to our only chance of escape from imminent death.

At least I can't complain about having a boring life.

* * *

**A/N:** **So can anyone identify the thing that makes this chapter different from every single previous chapter of this fic? -Jeopardy theme-**


	39. Bars

**A/N: So apparently my question at the end of the last chapter wasn't a particularly challenging one. Everyone who reviewed figured it out. Unfortunately, that wasn't as many people as I was hoping. A lot of my regulars seemed to be missing, which made me rather sad. Did I lose people because I went so long without posting? That would suck.**

**Anyway, here's the next chapter. Enjoy.**

* * *

**147**

A few turns and a couple hallways later, I heard the Director swear as she turned the corner ahead of us. Fang and I shared a worried glance, and then I made my way quickly around the corner to see what the commotion was. With all of our flashlights combined there was plenty of light to see by, but the shadows still made things kind of eerie, and my anxiety level was steadily rising with every unexpected thing that came up.

When I saw that it wasn't Jeb or multiple guards that the Director was swearing about, my jumpy nerves settled down a bit.

"Hi, Professor," I said. "Good to see you."

Professor Henry smiled. "It's good to see you too, Max. I have to admit that I was a little worried Jeb had found you and hooked you up to his new machines."

Fang, who had followed me rather closely around the corner, looked quizzically at him. "What new machines?"

"I don't know," the professor replied. "The electrician didn't seem to know very much abut them, only that they had their own generators and could be turned ff with the master switch in the electric room."

"He said something about mind-body switching," Doctor Jones offered. "It didn't sound good."

"That explains a lot, actually," Fang said. "We wondered why they just turned off like that."

The professor's eyebrows rose, and I gave him a brief but thorough explanation. By the time I was finished, the rest off the flock had gathered behind us.

"Why aren't we moving?" Iggy asked. "We really should be moving."

"Right," I agreed. "Gazzy, what's our time?"

"Forty minutes, fifty-three seconds," he replied.

"I don't understand," the doctor said. "What are you timing?"

I started walking and indicated that they should too. "How long we have until we all explode. My pyros may have gone a little overboard this time. The Director is finding us a door."

"You kids really know how to make things interesting," Professor Henry commented wryly.

I grinned. "I like to call it talent."

* * *

**148**

I shone my miniature flashlight at the door in front of us. A dark Exit sign hung above it, suggesting that the Director had led us to the right place.

"Okay, great," I said. "Now how do we get those very solid-looking metal bars to go away?"

The Director made a frustrated grunting noise. "Jeb must have put the building into lockdown before the power went out. Those bars won't move now."

I looked at her incredulously. "You're telling me that all of the ways out are blocked and there's nothing we can do about it?"

"Yes," she said.

"Okay," I said, turning to Gazzy and Iggy. "We can still avoid blowing up. We'll go back to wherever you set those things up and you'll turn them off."

"Can't," Iggy said.

"What do you mean, can't?" I exclaimed, starting to go into panic mode.

"We had limited supplies," he said. "No switches or anything. We just cut the wire."

I just stared at him for a long moment, all sorts of unpleasant things running through my head. Finally I managed to gasp, "We're all going to die."

"Max, hey," Fang said, grabbing my chin and forcing me to look him in the eye. "Remember when we first found out about everything, when we were all in that room? Remember what I said?"

I did. He had told me that if I gave up, the rest of the flock would too. I knew that, and a month ago I never would have showed them any sort of weakness because of that. I really was losing my touch. Damn it.

I took a deep breath and forced all thoughts of death out of my head. We were survivors. We always had been.

"Thank you," I told Fang very quietly. He nodded once and released me. I turned to the Director. "Is there anything we can do? Anywhere we can go?"

She thought for a moment, and I could feel the flock staring at me. I had really screwed up, but I couldn't take it back now. I looked up and met their gazes steadily. The only thing I could do now was try to prove to them that I was still the same strong leader they had always depended on.

Unfortunately, I was pretty sure that even if they still trusted me and followed me, they would never really see me the same way. As much as I loved Fang for being my backbone when my own wasn't enough, the flock wasn't supposed to see it. I had just damaged their image of me, and that was something that could never be fixed.

"The bunker," the Director said. "There's a bunker under the building for emergencies."

I nodded briskly. "That's perfect. Lead the way."

* * *

**149**

Jeb did not like being in anything less than perfect control of any situation, so it was easy to see why he was so incredibly angry about the one he was stuck in. Nothing was under his control. The experiments that had been so easily manipulated for fifteen years were running loose and proving themselves surprisingly capable of fighting and evading, and none of the guards could be persuaded to face them because they'd had their asses thoroughly whooped the last time.

"I thought you were supposed to be fearless!" Jeb raged at the lead guard.

"No, sir," the guard replied. "We're just gen'rally stronger than our enemies. Them bird-kids… They ain't right. They're small, but they're mean. I'd pr'fer to stay outta their way."

"This is outrageous!" Jeb roared. "You're more afraid of those misfits than you are of me?"

"Yes, sir," the guard said.

Jeb's eyes narrowed. "You will regret that statement."

"I don't think so, sir," the guard said. "Not if it keeps me away from them bird-kids."

The feeling of powerlessness that was increasing with every word the guard spoke was making Jeb angrier and angrier. He hadn't wrested control of things from the Director only to have them collapse around him. He was going to stop those experiments if it killed him. He refused to be a failure like his predecessor.

It was time for a new plan.

* * *

**A/N: So I'm trying something new, mostly because my household runs on solar power and with it being winter and rather cloudy, we don't have much power to run computers. I'm now writing my chapters in a notebook with a pencil (very antiquated-like), and transferring them to the computer after the fact. I've already done this once with my RuneScape fanfiction and it seemed to go okay, but I still feel like I should warn my readers, because it may effect my writing style. Also the length of my chapters, because my notebook doesn't have a word count tool. =P**

**Anyway, tell me what you think about that, and the chapter, in a lovely **_**review**_**. =)**


	40. Kidnapped

**A/N: I'm finally back! I know it's been a ridiculously long time, and for that I am truly sorry. But I'll have you know that I carried my notebook around with me almost everywhere, and the only time I didn't work on it was during my vacation in Boston last week. Which was a ton of fun, by the way.  
**

**But anyway, my mind has been dedicated to the task. It just took me a while to actually write the chapters. Because they were troublesome. Sorry.  
**

* * *

**150**

"So how far is it to this bunker, exactly?" I asked the Director after almost ten minutes of walking. "All the way across the building?"

"And one floor down," the Director said.

"Oh." I sighed. "At least we've still got like, twenty minutes before we all explode."

Fang looked at me. "Why would you say that?"

"Um…" I frowned. "Because it's true?"

He just shook his head.

"What?" I asked indignantly.

"Max," Iggy said, "that's the sort of statement that just begs fate to screw us over."

That's what the big deal was? I rolled my eyes and let the subject drop.

In the process of descending the staircase to what I assumed to be the ground floor, Fang and I somehow ended up a few paces behind the rest of the group. Considering that ours were the two smallest lights, that may not have been the best scenario.

I glanced toward him, only to find him looking levelly back at me. I quickly looked away again.

"Max," he said, and I could hear the exasperation in his voice.

"What?" I asked, torn between keeping my tone perfectly calm and adding some irritation to it. Neither was accurate, but I wasn't about to let him know that.

He sighed.

I made a snap decision and spoke again before he could elaborate. "Okay, I think I know what you want to talk about, but is now really the time?"

"We could all be dead in twenty minutes," he replied tonelessly. "Now is definitely the time."

I glared at him. "Shut up. We're not going to die."

"I don't think I'm willing to bet my eternal peace of mind on that."

I only had a vague idea of what he could possibly mean by that, but I didn't get a chance to ask him to elaborate.

"Max! Fang!"

The professor's shout sounded a little bit panicked, and Fang and I immediately dropped our conversation and dashed ahead.

"What is it?" I asked.

Nudge's eyes were wide and scared. "Gazzy's gone."

"_What_?" I looked around, taking in the six worried faces and the Director's irritated one. Gazzy wasn't there. "That's stupid. Where could he have gone?"

"If we knew that, do you think we'd be this frantic?" Professor Henry asked.

I turned to Angel. "You can't… sense his thoughts, or whatever it is you do?"

"It doesn't work like that, Max," she told me sadly.

I didn't have time to question her. We no longer knew how much time we had left, so finding Gazzy and speedily getting to the bunker was our top priority. I was going to have to take her answer as a 'no', and move on.

"We know he's not behind us," I said, "so let's keep going and hope he just got a little too far ahead."

None of us really expected that to be the case, but really, what choice did we have?

* * *

**151**

Gazzy hadn't meant to get so far ahead of the rest of the group, but the fact that Doom Time was ticking ever closer on his wrist kept him moving a little faster than the others. Combine that with an unfortunately placed corner to block visibility, and you get a perfect kidnapping opportunity. He was being whisked through a door and down another hallway before he even had time to drop his flashlight. The flock wasn't going to know what had happened to him. Crap.

"No, don't let go of him, fool," was the first thing he heard when he was brought into what looked like a small office. "Do you think he won't try to escape?"

Jeb. Of course it was Jeb.

Gazzy glared at Jeb as he crossed the room, unable to say anything with the guard's hand clamped firmly over his mouth.

"Hello, Gazzy," Jeb said, smiling. "It's so very nice to see you again."

"Gng dn hlgn," Gazzy replied angrily, struggling futilely against the guard's very thick, very strong arm.

Jeb waved his hand slightly, and suddenly Gazzy could speak. "I'm sorry, could you repeat that?"

Gazzy didn't waste time telling Jeb to go to hell a second time. There were more important things to say. "Look at my watch."

"What?" Jeb asked, frowning.

"Just look at it!"

Jeb's eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Don't let him move at all," he ordered the guard. Then he very cautiously moved closer until he could read the numbers on the watch's face.

"What does it say?" Gazzy asked him.

"Thirteen fifty-two."

That little? He hadn't checked it since he'd been with the flock, and he wouldn't have guessed that it had been five minutes already. He was going to have to work fast. "That's how long we have until this place blows up."

Jeb's face darkened, and a wave of his hand later Gazzy was once again being half suffocated. "Don't think you can manipulate me. That wasn't even a particularly convincing lie."

Gazzy's eyes widened in fear. If Jeb didn't believe the danger they were all in, he might delay things until it was too late for everyone.

"Mm nn lng!" he exclaimed.

Jeb's expression didn't change, but the slightest hint of doubt entered his eyes. He had to realize that unavoidable death was a bit much to be gambling about, didn't he?

He waved his hand yet again.

"Me and Iggy set up a bomb upstairs," Gazzy said quickly, before Jeb could change his mind. "We didn't have a switch or anything so we just cut the wire and set this watch for the same time as the bomb so we would know how much time we had and then we headed for the closest door."

"But the system is in lockdown," Jeb said, still looking somewhat skeptical, but also rather afraid. "The doors won't open."

"Yeah, we know," Gazzy said. "After we saw that, the Director told us about the bunker."

"You were going to the bunker?"

Gazzy nodded.

Jeb suddenly looked very worried. "But that means… She must not have told them…"

The last part sounded like he was talking more to himself, and Gazzy suddenly got a very bad feeling. The only thing he could make of it was the Director was keeping something from them.

Jeb snapped his fingers at the guard and headed for the door.

"Let's go," he said. "We have to find those experiments. Quickly."

* * *

**A/N: You may continue on to the next chapter. Unless you would like to review this one as well, which I certainly wouldn't complain about.  
**


	41. Finality

**A/N: So if you remember, I said that I was going to replace my author's note with the next chapter. I did, so if you haven't read chapter forty yet, please go back and do so before you read this one. Thanks.**

* * *

**152**

Once we had discovered that Gazzy was definitely not just a bit ahead of us, we kind of lost purpose. None of us wanted to keep going without him, but it wasn't like we could just dawdle around and hope that he showed back up. We didn't have time for that. We didn't have time for _any_ of this.

So we did what any decent team does under the threat of danger around every corner… We split up. We needed to do everything we could to speed this disaster up a little.

I was finding it increasingly difficult to keep track of time—sometimes five minutes felt like ten, and sometimes it felt like thirty seconds—so when I heard Nudge's exclamation, I had no idea how long it had been since Gazzy had disappeared. Were we all about to bid a sudden farewell to the world that none of us had really had a chance to see yet?

Trying not to let my panic overwhelm me, I ran toward where Nudge's yell had come from. Everyone else had already gathered, and they were all looking the same direction. I quickly joined them.

Jeb. Of course it was Jeb.

But he did have Gazzy with him, which was a bonus.

"So Gazzy tells me that this place I about to explode, and you're all headed to the bunker." Jeb indicated the guard restraining Gazzy. "If you want him back, you'll let me in."

We were all silent, staring at him.

What was I supposed to say? I didn't want to say yes, because this was _Jeb_ we were talking about, but I didn't feel like I could say no. That was pretty much the same as shooting him in the head, really.

"How much time do we have, Gazzy?" I asked.

He managed to get his arm at an angle that allowed him to see the watch's face. "Eleven-oh-six."

I turned to the Director. "How far to the bunker?"

"Not far."

It was a gamble, but the odds were good enough that I felt comfortable enough to take it. "Fang," I said, indicating with my head that we should retreat to a safe talking distance.

He nodded, and we backed around the nearest corner so that we were out of sight and far enough away that none of the others would hear us if we kept our voices down.

"I can't say no, Fang," I told him urgently.

He sighed. "I know you can't."

A short silence followed, which I broke when I realized that he wasn't going to give me an answer.

"Asking you what to do won't help at all, will it?"

"No," he said shortly. "Jeb's got us backed into a corner, here."

"Why's he even doing this?" I asked.

Fang raised a disbelieving eyebrow at me, and I waved my hand at him, entirely aware that my question seemed rhetorical.

"I mean," I clarified, "doesn't he have a ton of guards ready to incapacitate us? Why is he resorting to a hostage when he knows we could totally take him if we tried?"

He shrugged. "I don't know, and I don't thing it really matters right now. We need to make a decision before we get the others killed because we're taking our time."

"I could kiss you for your pronouns," I told him bluntly.

His mouth quirked into what, in our current situation, could count as a smile. "I'll collect when we're not in mortal peril, alright?"

I wasn't blushing, I wasn't running away, and I wasn't denying anything. At some point in all of this chaos, I had accepted that this was where Fang and I would end up. We had always been heading here, I had just been too dense to see it.

I was in up to my waist already. Might as well take the plunge.

"I'm holding you to that," I said.

That caused his facing-imminent-death smile to turn into a fully-fledged one, the likes of which I hadn't seen on him for months. I really couldn't stop myself from grinning back.

That is, until we heard the yell and the huge thump that followed it.

* * *

**153**

The guard that had been restraining Gazzy was flat on his back, obviously unconscious. Alive or not… Well, I wasn't really sure.

A couple feet away from him, Jeb was in a very similar state.

"What the hell happened?" I exclaimed.

Professor Henry pointed to Angel, a look of unease in his eyes.

Crap. Not again.

"Angel," I said, "what did you do?"

She smiled smugly, and I hoped to God that I would never see that expression on her face again. "I told the guard to hit Jeb, and then I made him hit himself. Now we can go to the bunker, right?"

She could do this, but somehow it didn't "work like that" when I asked her to find Gazzy? I looked helplessly at Fang, but he just shrugged.

Unfortunately, the truth was that she had done us a favor, however questionable her method. We honestly hadn't had time to settle the situation in any way that didn't have its problems.

"What are you all standing around for?" the Director snapped, already heading down the hallway. "Problem solved, let's move!"

"I don't like this," Professor Henry muttered.

"I don't either," I said, "but we don't have a choice at this point."

He sighed, looking pained. "I realize that, but it's still not right."

I smiled sadly. "Come on, Professor."

Only Angel, the Director, and Iggy didn't glance back at least once as we left Jeb behind, but as soon as our lights were turned in another direction, the darkness quickly swallowed the two comatose bodies.

Looking back wasn't going to help us now.

* * *

**154**

"Okay, seriously," I said, starting to get annoyed, "how much farther? You said we were close."

"We are," the Director replied. "I've never _timed_ how long it takes to get around in here."

"I hope we're really close," Gazzy said. "We only have two and a half minutes."

There was a short pause, and I'm pretty sure everyone else was panicking in their head just like I was.

"We might want to run," the Director said.

Running in a group when the only light sources were being held by the people running was not a pleasant experience. Beams of light went every which way, sometimes smacking me in the face and more often than not doing absolutely nothing to tell me where my feet were going to land. It was a damn good thing the floor was perfectly flat, because otherwise we would have all ended up in a tangled heap.

It took us slightly too long to realize that the Director had come to a halt, and there was a bit of a pile-up in front of the bunker door. We were forced to waste a few of our dwindling seconds to sort it out.

"Light," the Director snapped, once Nudge had stepped back and allowed her to peel herself away from the door. "I need light on the dial."

Gazzy pointed his huge flashlight at the door, and I groaned as I realized what dial the Director was talking about.

"It has a combination lock?" I said. "You had better know the number."

"Of course I do," she replied heatedly, already turning the knob.

"Hey, where's the professor?" Nudge asked suddenly. "He didn't get, like, lost, did he?"

"No," Doctor Jones said. "He's just a bit slow. Doesn't do much running, being a professor."

"And you do?" Iggy asked.

"I ran track," the doctor replied. "All through high school and college."

"Thirty seconds," Gazzy announced, just as the Director got the door open and Professor Henry came up behind us, puffing more than a little.

"Everybody in," I said, making an urgent shooing motion with my hands.

"This is kinda crowded," Nudge said as she crammed herself in between Angel and Iggy.

Oh, no. _Please let us all fit…_

But once it was just me, Fang, and the professor left in the hall, it had become painfully clear that we were not all going to fit. Someone was going to get left outside.

I looked between Fang and the professor, torn between self-preservation and the urge to shove the two of them into the bunker and close the door.

Fang would hate me forever if I did that.

"Ten seconds!" Gazzy called out to us.

Professor Henry sighed, an incredibly weary yet accepting sound that told me exactly what he was going to do. I started to shake my head.

"I've done something good with my life," he said. "Maybe I've made up for working here in the first place. Use what I've given you to its fullest extent, alright?"

With his last sentence, he pushed me backward into Fang, who dragged me into the bunker.

Then the door closed with a resounding boom, and a second later the bunker shuddered as the School exploded around us.

* * *

**A/N: I actually had a bit of trouble writing this chapter, because I pretty much stopped reading Maximum Ride fanfiction a few months back, and have been reading a ton of Fullmetal Alchemist fanfiction recently. That caused Max and Fang to turn into Ed and Winry in the middle of an important scene, which was not very helpful at all. I pulled them back from that, but I'm still not sure they're quite who they should be. Hopefully it's not really noticeable.**

**Anyway, it's been ages since I've gotten any reviews, and I'm really looking forward to it. Don't let me down, people!**

…**Even though I let all of you down by taking so long. I know only deserve a review or two, if any, but that would still make me sad. Especially since I'm half convinced that I've lost the majority of my readers by taking an accidental, temporary hiatus. -is anxious-  
**

**The last chapter will be up next Friday. I was going to post it next Monday, a week from today, but then I realized that next Friday was exactly the two-year anniversary of when I posted the very first chapter, and I just couldn't resist. So it'll be next Friday, so long as my Internet doesn't crap out on me. -crosses fingers-  
**


	42. Aftershock

**A/N: Can someone explain to me how _fifty_ people have this on alert, and yet I somehow only managed to get four reviews for the last two chapters? I don't get it. **

**Anyway, in my first author's note, on the very first chapter, I commented on the fact that I was starting the story at chapter forty-two of STWAOES, and how that was cool. After I wrote chapter thirty-nine, I realized that the rest of the story was going to fit extraordinarily well into three more chapters, and then I got **_**really, really excited**_**.**

**That's right. This story has **_**forty-two chapters.**_** As I am a geek, that makes me supremely happy. Thank you, oh great gods of coincidence! Also, the fact that I am posting this last chapter _on the exact two-year anniversary _of when I posted chapter one just makes this feel like a hugely momentous occasion. O_o  
**

* * *

**Epilogue**

I'm not really sure how long we sat there in silence after the explosion, but it felt like quite a while. I hadn't known Professor Henry very long at all, but I had liked him a lot. He had risked torture and imprisonment to free us, and now he had given up his life so that neither Fang nor I would have to.

I hadn't even known his first name.

The silence was suddenly interrupted by a small, choked sob. I wasn't sure if it was Nudge or Angel, and I didn't have any room to turn around and check.

I moved my small light over the door, searching for a handle. I found the only thing that looked plausible and shoved at it.

The air that washed over me was like nothing I had ever experienced. It was choked with ash and smelled like smoke and burnt plastic, but somehow it was still one of the most wonderful things I had ever tasted.

I knew that after this, no fake reality was ever going to fool me again.

I stepped out into the ruins, feeling ash land on my shoulders and head. Thankfully, there was no body anywhere nearby. I knew the younger ones would have found that very hard to deal with.

The others followed me out, and I heard the owner of the choked sob begin to cry fully. It was now easy to identify as Angel. As terrible as I felt, I couldn't help but be slightly relieved. After the stunt she had pulled with Jeb, I had been a little worried that she was lacking some fundamental sense of empathy.

As I made my way over to Angel, I catalogued the states of the others. Fang looked slightly haunted, but he was stoic as always and I knew he would be fine. Iggy had knelt down to feel the ground. He seemed to still be processing the difference between the fake outdoors and the real one. Nudge was crying, but she was doing it silently. The tears streaming down her cheeks somehow seemed less like despair and more like simple tears of sadness. I think that I tended to forget just how indomitable Nudge could be. Gazzy had tears on his cheeks also, but he was looking around in wonder at the sky and the trees and the rubble, and I knew that he wouldn't let his grief stop him from appreciating our newfound freedom.

Doctor Jones looked miserable and the Director looked indifferent, but I couldn't bring myself to care about anyone outside of my flock when Angel looked as terrible as she did.

"Hey," I said, kneeling down next to her and enfolding her in a hug.

She sniffled into my shoulder. "Why, Max? Why did he have to die?"

I couldn't answer that. I couldn't give her a decent reason for the fact that a good man like Professor Henry had died while the instigator of everything horrible in our lives was standing a few feet away from us, perfectly alive.

The world isn't fair. I had learned that a long time before, but I guess now it was Angel's turn to realize it.

So instead of trying to explain any of it, I just sat there and held her as she cried it all out.

A few minutes after Angel's sobs had died down into a series of small sniffles, Gazzy broke the silence that had fallen over the group.

"She knew."

We all followed his pointing finger to the Director, who looked startled and just a little bit scared by his unfriendly tone of voice.

"What did she know?" I asked, sliding Angel gently off of my lap and standing up. I had a niggling feeling that I was about to be very angry.

"She knew that we wouldn't all fit in the bunker," Gazzy said. "She knew it was tiny."

Now that he said that, it made perfect sense. It was her building, of course she would know how big the emergency bunker was.

"Jeb said it," Gazzy continued, "but I didn't know what he meant."

I had been right. I was now very angry.

"What was I supposed to do?" the Director exclaimed, taking a step back. I guess she saw the fury in my eyes. "If I had told you that someone wasn't going to fit, who would have been left behind? Me!"

"Yes," I said, "and that's the way it should have happened."

Her face twisted into an unattractive scowl. "You _would_ think that, but how do you know? You're not God."

"No," I replied, "but neither are you, and you've tried to play at it more than I ever have. We're living proof of that."

Fang stepped up beside me. "I think you should leave. None of us like you, especially not now."

"We're in Death Valley!" she retorted. "Where am I supposed to go?"

"I don't know and I don't care," Fang said. "I suppose it's your choice, but trust me, your chances with us aren't very good."

Without another word, she turned around and stalked away.

I turned to face my flock, who had gathered into a loose semi-circle behind me and Fang.

"So… We're out," I said. "We're free."

"Yep," Iggy agreed. "What now?"

It was the question that I had been thinking but hadn't wanted to ask. I was the leader, I was supposed to answer questions like that.

"Well," I said slowly, "I guess we… travel. See what we've been missing. Find out how much of what they invented for us is real."

"The templates were all real locations," Doctor Jones said, joining our pow-wow. "New York City, Colorado, Virginia… They all really look like that. We may have taken a few liberties, but not many."

"What about people?" Iggy asked hopefully.

Doctor Jones shook his head. "I'm sorry, Iggy, but your parents don't actually exist. Neither does Tess."

Iggy's face fell. "Oh. I guess I should have known that she was too perfect for me to be real."

"And I don't have a mom and a sister in Arizona," I concluded. Doctor Jones nodded. "Please tell me Jeb wasn't actually my dad."

"He wasn't," the doctor said. "He just enjoyed messing with you."

"Bastard," I said unfeelingly. It seemed wrong to hold a grudge against a dead man, however sadistic he had been.

"Doctor," Fang said suddenly, "what was Professor Henry's first name?"

Doctor Jones looked surprised by the question, but promptly answered, "William."

Fang nodded. "Alright, thank you. I propose a moment of silence in honor of Professor William Henry, a man who gave us everything and lost everything in return."

I smiled at Fang gratefully and reached over to take his hand. He had remembered to ask the question that I had almost immediately forgotten about, and turned it into a more poetic tribute than I could have managed.

He squeezed my hand, and we both dropped our chins slightly to remember and give thanks.

We were all silent for at least a minute before I raised my head.

"Okay, guys," I said, "I think it's about time we left this place behind."

"Agreed," Iggy said emphatically.

I looked up at the sky, which was overcast with the remains of the thunderstorm but sort of beautiful all the same.

I smiled and extended my wings for the first time in what felt like years. "Let's find out how it really feels to fly."

* * *

**A/N: And that is the end of Pinch Me, I Must Be Dreaming. Now here comes my long, heartfelt speech.  
**

**First, I just have to thank everyone who read the story, even if some of you didn't make it to the end (and therefore aren't even reading this). If you read it at all, thank you. If you reviewed, thank you even more. If you stayed with me through all of my inconsistent updating, thank you _so very much_. I can't even imagine how frustrating that must have been, and for one last time, I apologize. **

**I know a lot of people go back and find all of the usernames of people who reviewed and list them here in a big thank you note, but frankly, I don't really have the time or the patience for that. That doesn't mean I don't appreciate every review I've gotten. I really, really do. Thank you all. For the time being, I feel like this story is one of the better things I've written, and having a few other people along for the ride has been very rewarding. There were times I almost got so frustrated as to give up on it, and you people are what stopped me from doing so. (Yes, that was kind of sappy. Sorry.) I've also made an excellent friend from this story. Thanks for everything, AmyQueen95. =]  
**

**And secondly... Well, I don't think I'm actually resigning from FFN as I thought I was going to be, because a few Fullmetal Alchemist ideas have been plaguing me and I may feel the need to get them out. However, I am almost certainly resigning from the Maximum Ride fandom. I had toyed with the idea of a Pinch Me sequel, but I'm just not that interested in the characters anymore, and I really don't want to get into another long fanfiction that's going to hold me back from working on much of anything else.  
**

**I've been on fanfiction for three years now, and in those three years, I've learned so much about my writing and what I'm capable of. The writing improvement to time ratio has never been quite so impressive for me. All three of those years have been spent among the people of the Maximum Ride fandom, and leaving is honestly going to make me quite sad. I wish I could say I was still planning to stay among you all by reading and reviewing fanfictions, but unless they're part of a series I'm still reading or from an author I already know, that's not true. It actually hasn't been for a while now. Like I said, while I'll always have an attachment to the characters, they're not really doing it for me anymore. If any of you happen to be in the Doctor Who or Fullmetal Alchemist fandoms (or any others I happen to pick up along the way), I might see you there. Otherwise, this is probably goodbye.  
**

**You have no idea how much I'm going to treasure this last batch of reviews, and the more it contains, the more I'll treasure it. -shameless hint hint nudge nudge-  
**

**Arrividerci, my friends. I hope you enjoyed Pinch Me, I Must Be Dreaming as much as I did.  
**


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